


Charcoal on parchment

by MissesMarvel



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 1940s, Anal Fingering, Anal Play, Anal Sex, Art Student AU, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexuality, Explicit Consent, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Foreplay, Friendship, Gay, Gay Male Character, Gay Sex, M/M, Masturbation, Post-World War II, Rimming, Sexual Tension, Skinny!Steve, Stalking, Stucky - Freeform, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Vet!bucky, marvel AU, oh so much gayness, there is going to be sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-29
Updated: 2016-06-23
Packaged: 2018-07-11 00:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 23,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7014673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissesMarvel/pseuds/MissesMarvel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summary</p><p>Steve Rogers is a skinny, small, constantly sick art-student in his mid-twenties who carries a big secret. For weeks he had been obsessed with a complete stranger, drawing him, watching him, imagining a world in which he could just go over to him to talk.<br/>But in Steves world, good looking, nice men don’t fall in love with guys like Steve.</p><p>His world collapses as he finally meets the guy, leading to an entirely different outcome than the student would’ve ever imagined. Not only is Steve now confronted with problems, he never even knew could exist, he also has to face that his obsession might not stay a secret.</p><p>Infos</p><p>AU!Modernized-1940s-setting: modern language, homosexuality/bisexuality/etc. as well as all skin colours are accepted (but might not be appreciated by everyone), after WWII</p><p>AU!Marvel-Characters will appear in the background of this story</p><p>PLOT with porn</p><p>Tags are added (chapter after chapter), as well as new characters and eventual triggers are going to be in the note before the chapter</p><p>As always I am stating, not to be a native speaker and beg you to call me out on grammar/spelling errors asap.</p><p>Have fun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Of baseball fields and hot Sunday evenings

**Author's Note:**

> Hey and welcome to this story,
> 
> my Name is Michelle (in case you want to address me personally in the comments) and I am very happy that you found your way into this story.
> 
> It is currently undergoing some slight changes (due to critique (which is awesome and appreciated), that means updates will come slower than usual (every day/every two days). If you have any concerns about stuff you don’t understand/that I should clear up let me know.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet Steve, his obsession and Peggy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: yes

Sunday the 23 of July, 1947  
New York

His muscles contracted under the white shirt and Steve had a hard time catching his breath. Ex-soldier, probably went to Germany, like Steve would have, if he wouldn’t have been the tiny mess he was.   
Next to this glorious man with the dark hair and the thin layer of sweat coating every inch of his body, Steve felt even worse than usual. But damn. He just could not stop watching. The dog-tags around the thick, muscular neck glistened in the sun and Steve felt a need to run down there and throw himself at this guy. 

Yeah, like that would work.

As if he knew Steve was watching, the man took a bottle of water and sprinkled himself with its content to cool down.   
Funny, how it had the exact opposite effect on Steve. His hands were shaking as he formed muscles with the piece of charcoal on the paper in front of him.   
Steve had a strong urge to draw this guy, each and every muscle on him. Oh, he wanted to rip the white shirt of this perfect body and discover every inch with his fingers, his tongue and his pencils and brushes. He chuckled, weird how needy his virgin-ass could become, once a hot soldier played baseball in front of him. 

“Yo art nerd! Watcha up to?” 

Jesus Christ.

His face lit up and turned bride red in a matter of seconds. Peggy Carter was a stunning, smart, pretty, talented badass of a woman and Steve had no idea why on earth she chose to hang out with him.   
“Nothing much”, he mumbled into his shirt and shut his sketchbook. “Sorry, I’m having a bit of a sunburn here...” He had a hard time hiding his face, his boner and the drawings at the same time. “That ‘sunburn’ sure came quick. Are you sure it’s a sunburn and not a reaction to the sportsmen you’ve been watching for the last hour?”   
Steve reached for his inhaler, took a deep breath through it and tried making a serious face. “It’s summer, the sun is shining, it’s a sunburn.” Peggy laughed and sat herself down, next to Steve in the rich green grass, pulling her sunglasses out of her backpack. “So you're saying you’re ignoring those guys over there?” Steve acted surprised, “what guys? Oh, those?” Peggy seemed unimpressed, “don’t even try it Steve, I’ve seen you draw them.”

He packed his drawing utensils together, to stand up and stretch. “I have no idea what you’re talking about Peggy. Imma gonna go now, see ya!”   
His cheeks felt hot and he knew he was bride ref. Peggy teased him, at least he was hoping she wasn’t serious. For the last two months he had been up this hill every Sunday afternoon to watch the baseball fields. But he didn’t give shit about the games or the players for that sake, his only interest was this one guy he spotted the first time he went up there to draw the skyline.   
At first, he felt like a stalker, trying to tell himself that it was only an aesthetic want to draw him, but now he had lost all his shame. Well, not all of it no, he was still scared his two friends in this world would find out. He had only them.

Peggy, who was an English teacher and Howard, who… well… he… okay, Steve didn’t really knew what Howard did, except for the occasional explosions on his workplace and the fact that he made more money in a month than Steve in a year. To be fair, Steve was an art student and worked part time, but he was pretty sure Howard would still make more money than him, if he would have a full time job. 

They knew that he was bisexual, though. It was not a big deal for them, which made Steve a lucky man. Being anything different than hetero, white and male may technically be seen as okay, but not everybody had gotten the memo on that. There still were some people, well, quite many of them, that openly despised certain lifestyles and identities. 

As Steve walked down to the train-station he began wondering if he would ever hear the voice of his personal little god. He imagined it being a little husky and maybe, just maybe, having a slight accent to it, since this guy didn’t fit the American stereotype that well. Oh god. What if he was British, like Peggy, or French, no French people don’t look like this, right? But French would be sexy!   
Judging by the popularity of the state Steve lived in, he was either Italian, Irish, French, German or a mix of those. 

He decided to think further about that at home, when he was alone. There was nothing worse than having a boner while standing in a train fully packed with people on a hot Sunday evening.


	2. Of needy guys and secret plans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Introducing to you: Howard Stark and his relationship with Steve.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: yes

There were two kinds of sweat.

Steve counted the minutes, no the seconds, till he finally came home. The train was so hot and full of sweaty people, but not sexy-sweaty like his personal god. No there was no one like him. 

Rogers! Focus!

Excitement crawled up his sleeves and set shivers down his spine. Yeah, there were two kinds of sweat. There was the kind that smelled like rotten eggs and death, that emerged out of exhaustion and disgust, that reminded one of uncomfortable seats and too many people on too little space; and then, there was the kind that felt like salt on skin, that smelled like love and lust and summer and that emerged between two bodies touching, that arose from people so excited about what they're doing that they forgot their tired muscles no matter what they're doing or how they're looking. 

God, Steve, really needed to stop this. Crawling up this hill, getting excited about someone, who literally didn’t knew he existed, being obsessed over someone, who was probably dating a beautiful girl with nice hips, short skirts and a smile brighter than diamonds. A girl like Peggy. 

Oh god, what if Peggy was dating him. What if that was the reason for her sneaking up on him earlier, to tell him to stop stalking her boyfriend. He nearly missed his station, thinking about how nice Peggy and this guy would look together. It made his heart heavy and his steps harder. 

Bullshit, she wouldn’t just date someone and not tell Steve. Back in the days when she was dating Howard, she told him everything. After they broke up it got super awkward between the three of them. Howard married Maria and had a son now, god when did they all grew up? 

No, what was he thinking, of course they were grown up, Howard was 29 by now, Peggy 25 and he, well he was the extremely awkward 26 year old virgin with no game at all.   
At 5”3 and 105 lbs, there wasn’t much to impress women, or men, or anyone. He took the steps to his door, unlocked it and sank down at the other side of the door. What on earth was he doing with his life?  
He could search for someone like Peggy, just a little less into rich geniuses. But who was he kidding? Not in a million years he ever could fall in love with someone different that this guy. He could not live a happy life without him, while this guy would die happily with 10 kids and a loving wife. Man, life sure was frustrating.

He pulled himself up and walked a couple steps just to let himself fall down on his bed. 

“Rough day?”

What on earth?

Steve jumped up and looked around his apartment. For a couple seconds he thought he’d gone crazy and his portraits started talking to him, then he saw Howard standing at the kitchen counter.   
“How did you get in here?” Steve asked, rubbing his eyes, watching his friend laughing and pulling a device out of his pocket with a green light attached to it. “Oh wait, I don’t wanna know. I already know more about war secrets than half our government. You really need to stop telling me stuff like that.” 

Howard, however chuckled and put the device back in his pocket. “Have you eaten yet?” Steve shook his head and stood up. “You?” Howard turned to Steves kitchen and opened the fridge. “Wow, nothing, who would have guessed that? I’m gonna get some food and then we have to talk, I need a favor, pal.” Steves brows rose, “what about Maria and the kid?” - “Shes with her parents. Be right back.” 

He wondered what Howard wanted, but his mind wandered off pretty much immediately after the door closed. His sketchbook! Steve unpacked his backpack and swiped some dust of his most important treasure. The book that contained the drawings of… him. If only he knew his name… the second he heard the door open, he shut the book, looking up to his friend smiling dirtily.   
“So, did you draw a special someone or should I be worried my best friend is falling in love with a book?” Steve closed his eyes and tried looking as annoyed as possible. “I caught some squirrels in the park and drew them. They're cute. Stop spying on me. Jesus, you’re worse than Peggy!”  
Steve regretted it the second he spoke. No matter what had happened between them, and even after he married Maria, Howard was still madly in love with Peggy. Steve was just hoping it wouldn’t ruin them, that they maybe one day could return to normal and man, he wished he would find someone to love that hard. Someone real. Not someone in his sketchbook. 

“Man, your obvious sexual frustration speaks for itself. I’ve seen that look on your face when you had your sketchbook open, do you think I’m blind?” Howard chuckled. He put the pizza cartons on the table and held both hands over his head, “but man, if you don’t wanna talk about it, fine with me. Let’s dig in these pizzas before they get cold.” Steve put his book on a shelf and sat down to get himself a piece of the food in front of him. Howard grinned and looked at Steve fighting with the cheese pulling strings.   
Steve looked up, “what?”   
His friend grinned even wider, “you’re cute, do you know that?” Steve squinted his eyes and swallowed all the pizza in his mouth. “Isn’t it a bit late do discover the secret gay feelings you have about me, about which I by the way knew all along!” They both laughed. “Yeah, I missed jumping on that train about five years ago. But I need you to be cute for me, well not me, but for a…. let’s say mission. I need you to spy on someone for me I know is gay and, well, you are, I mean, you… you dig both right? So I need you to… why are you laughing?”   
Steve tried catching his breath in between his laughing attack and the asthma creeping up on him. “You are the cute one if you really think my ass could be bait for any fish in the ocean, no matter if male or female. I ain’t no 26 year old virgin for no reason, pal. Also”, he set down the slice of pizza he was holding, “I know absolutely nothing out spies and shit. Don’t you have undercover agents for that kind of work?”   
Howard threw his pizza crust back in the box and leaned forward, “This guy works with me, he knows all of our guys. And you know more than most of my co-workers. We both know that. Steve. Please just think about it. It would be paid generously.”   
Steve looked at him as unimpressed as possible, “so you are serious about this?” His friend nodded. “Man”, he sighted, “you’re not going to get me in trouble, right?” Howard chuckled, “I am pretty sure you are completely capable of getting yourself in trouble hotshot, no help from me needed.” 

When Howard left the apartment, Steve lay down on his bed and gave this proposition some more thought. He would meet up with this guy next Friday. Kinda sad that his third date ever was a set up to take a spy down, helping Howard to find out if he was selling weapon infos to the Russians. Pretty much all of the Us was focussed on the Russians right now. As if this country didn’t have enough problems already.

His thoughts travelled to the sketchbook on the shelf. No, he said to himself. 

I won’t, I can’t, I have to move on. I won’t look at him again, he thought – on his way to the sketchbook. He knew he was weak, but damn, this guy. The only thing ruining his sketches was that, no matter how hard he tried, he never got the face of his little god right. 

If only he could trace the face with his fingers, see it right in front of him instead of having 50 yards in between them. God, Howard was right, his sexual frustration was REAL. He needed to get his head off this guy. Or on him. 

When Steve closed his eyes this evening, he felt like he was making a mistake. Should he really go for the job Howard proposed? What if it was dangerous? What if… if this guy would laugh right in his face and tell him to piss off, because of the way Steve looked? He fell asleep feeling lonely and dumb, but sadly, that was nothing new for him.


	3. Of skinny boys and handsome men

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: yes

Friday the 28 of July, 1947  
New York

Oh god, why did he sign up for this. Howard dragged him to the car, fast and expensive – what else would you expect from Howard Stark, he even dressed him “nicely” - meaning the absolute opposite of Steves usual style, leaving him no possible way of bailing. But Steve knew, even if Howard was acting like he really needed this favor, the second Steve would tell him no, he would abort. No matter what it would mean for any of them.   
To be honest, Steve hated the idea of trying to get someone to fall for him (he still couldn’t believe that Howard actually thought anyone could find him even remotely attractive), but he loved the fact that he finally was able to serve his country. It still dragged down his self-esteem that he didn’t get to serve in war, although he knew it most definitely would have killed him. 

“Ready?” Howard looked nervous and Steve hoped, he didn’t look like that, because he knew something about this guy, he didn’t tell Steve. Like, being a mass murderer or something.   
“Sure thing, pal.” They nodded at each other and Steve leaned back in his seat and tried breathing normally.   
“You remember the plan? Get in there, introduce yourself as the blind date I set him up with and make him like you. You have to get in his apartment! Now, once you're in...” Steve interrupted him, “I get him distracted and search for proof of contact with the Russians. After that, get the hell outta there. Got it.” They both laughed nervously. “All I gotta do is the one thing I have never been able to do with anyone, seduce him. So, no problem, huh?” Howard touched his arm, but looked forward to the street. “You can do this pal, something tells me he has a thing for skinny, pretty punks like you.” - “Not sure if that’s a compliment or nah, also not sure if this information is calming or making things worse, but I appreciate the try Howy.” 

When they pulled in on a parking spot next to the diner Howard stopped the car and smiled at Steve. “I know where he lives, I’m going to be nearby, just search for my car, okay?” Steve nodded and opened the car door, “one last thing Howard, how does this guy look?” - “Oh”, Howard grinned, “you will know who he is.”  
The music hit Steve in the face, after the unpleasant silence outside. He looked around and spotted two drunk guys talking about life right next to the entrance, a teenage-girl and a mid-forty-year-old guy with a disappearing hairline he prayed was her father, two waitresses with yellow costumes and curled up, brown hair, talking behind the counter and – oh my.   
Adrenaline rushed through his veins as he saw the back of a tall, muscular guy with brown hair. Was that… could that be… was it possible in any way that the guy he had to seduce for Howard was… his god? His muse, the guy he had been obsessing about for nearly 9 weeks now?   
Every bit of his body was shaking as he walked over to the table, not knowing whether he wanted that guy to be his god – so that he could talk to him for once, or not, so that his obsession wouldn’t eventually turn out to be a Russian spy. 

He knew that his obsession wasn’t from the US. And if he would be Russian, he still could be an ex-soldier with dog-tags hanging around his neck. 

Oh god, please don’t be him.

As he pushed himself forward to get a look at the face of his ‘blind date’ he nearly started crying out of joy. This guy was physically perfect, everything about him, but he was not Steves god. No, he had the same perfect body, but just like sweat, there are two kinds of attractiveness.   
One, that makes you shiver, that physically hurts you, that makes you ache at night because you know you will never be able to be with that person or even get that person to look at you.   
And one that is temporary and goes by, as you pass a stranger you think is hot.

This guy was hot, but nothing about him made Steve shiver. Except the look he gave Steve, as he sat down on the other side of the table. 

“You’re Steve, I suppose?” Steve nodded and tried smiling as casually as he could. “Yeah, I am. And you must be, oh sorry, Howard must’ve forgotten to tell me your name.” - “The name’s Jack. Oh, that’s alright, he forgot to tell me some stuff about you as well.” Steves heart shrieked. There we go, he would get rejected and Howard would hate him for being so small and unattractive and… “He totally forgot to mention how cute you are.” 

What? Was that happening? Like, right now, was this guy serious?

Some instinct, Steve never thought he had, kicked in and he started smiling at his ‘date’. “Thank you, I think he just wanted to surprise you with that.” They both laughed and Steve felt almost bad, setting this guy up. He seemed kinda nice. 

Jack had brown hair, as Steve had noticed before, dark brown eyes, a straight nose (although Steve was sure, that this was the only straight thing about this man) and a jawline you could cut yourself at. 

“Hey, what can I bring you two…?” Steve heard the voice of the waitress dripping with condescension and just the right bit of disgust to still be subtle. Being queer was such a fun thing to be. “Coffee for me, do you want anything Steve?” He nodded and ordered a coffee as well.   
As the waitress walked away, Jack looked at Steve with an apologizing look in his eyes. “Sorry ‘bout that, it isn’t always easy for guys like us, huh?” - “No, it sure as hell isn’t.”

They began talking and Steve listened to Jack telling him he worked with Howard, being an engineer from Queens, being 27 years old, having family in west France – all whilst trying to give as little information out as he could, without seeming cold.   
Jack made it quite hard for him, being way nicer than Steve imagined him to be when Howard told him about the set up and why he thought Jack was a spy. 

According to Howard, he had seen him talking on the telephone in some strange language (presumably Russian or Polish) and he had seen a tattoo of the communist sign on his left shoulder, through a white shirt. The communist sign. How stupid of a spy would someone have to be, to get that tattooed? 

As the hours went by, Steve was pretty sure he could end up at the flat of this guy, but he also began feeling horribly guilty for using the sympathy between him and Jack to screw him over. He watched his ‘date’ pay (after he refused a split) and walked out of the diner with him. Howards car was long gone and Steve felt kinda scared. He barely knew this guy, how in hell could people go on one-night-stands so casually without fearing for their lives?

“I live nearby, do you wanna come check it out? You said you wanted to see the view from the 15th floor.” Steve laughed and nodded, letting Jack lead him through the late-night-traffic.

Nice job cat-fishing potential war-spies with your bony ass, Rogers. He highfived himself as Jack wasn’t looking and felt extremely stupid, but also kinda proud. 

This feeling didn’t last long.

Concern crawled up his sleeve as he noticed that he had no idea where they were heading. He knew Brooklyn, but this was out of his range. 

As he climbed up the stairs, he saw Howards car in the corner of his eyes, standing nearly a block away, but he was there. He felt better, that was, until the door closed behind him and he knew, he was alone with Jack. Completely. Alone.


	4. Of destiny and coincidence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally at least a small, kinda Stucky moment.  
> And lots of drama.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: Slight  
> \- Explicit Sex: No, but making out  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: yes

“Would you like a real drink?” Jack asked firmly, already heading to the kitchen. But Steve was kind sidetracked by the spectacular view of the city that was presented to him in the living room. They had talked about New York looking gorgeous at night, especially from the 15th floor, but seeing it himself was something entirely different. 

As soon as Jack had left for the kitchen, Steve ripped his eyes apart from the skyline (he wished he could use this apartment to draw) and started searching for anything Russian, as discreet as possible.

But there was nothing there.

Not even one tiny piece of evidence, that this guy played for the wrong team.

Was that Howards way of being funny, setting him up with a hot gay guy so that he could get some? Oh my god, what if that guy was a hooker, send by Howard to make Steve feel better about himself. No, he wouldn’t do that, right? Right? 

Steve was about to give up and sneak out, as a little voice in his head took over. 

Who said he had to marry this guy. He was hot, he was horny and willing to be with Steve, which was more Steve had ever achieved in his life so far. In the middle of this thought, Jack came back from the kitchen with two cold beers in his hands. 

Meh, fuck it.

Steve never had felt as ridiculous as he felt kissing this guy, he didn’t even wanted to know how it must’ve looked. He nearly had to jump, reaching the face of his date, but man, it sure was worth it. If someone had told him before, how nice kissing someone felt, his former loneliness would have probably raised the roof. Thank god, he never knew what he was missing, up to this point. 

The bottles fell to the ground, but neither of them cared, as Jack pulled Steve towards him, lifted him up (with one hand… Steve really didn’t weigh that much), still kissing but somehow finding his way into his bedroom. 

It wasn’t until Jack began kissing down Steves neck (Jesus! What a feeling!), that Steve began thinking about Howard standing in front of this apartment block. Why would he do that if he just wanted to couple Steve with Jack? 

He probably really thought that Jack was a spy. But he was wrong, right? Steve had looked everywhere he could without making noise and there was nothing there, connecting Jack and any country that wasn’t North American. 

Jack slowly pulling Steves shirt over his head, made it really hard for Steve to think. Apart from other things it made hard. But as Jack basically sat on top of Steve, stripping off his own shirt, exposing the most perfect six pack Steve ever had the pleasure to look at (to be fair, so far this was the fourth, but still) he couldn’t stop thinking about that tattoo. It was stupid, it felt stupid, but Steve knew, he would only be able to enjoy this, if he knew for sure, that Jack wasn’t the evil bastard, Howard thought he was. 

He tried pushing himself upwards, which ended in both of them flipping over and falling from the bed, Jack laughing, Steve panting – but still trying to get a look at Jacks shoulders. As he slipped through Jacks arms on the left and right side of his face to get back up to the bed, he finally saw. 

On the good side, there was no tattoo.   
On the bad side, there was a huge scar, looking like a piece of skin had been cut out or burned.

“Jesus”, Steve tried catching his breath and looking as none-threatening and innocent as he could, “what happened to your shoulder?”   
Jacks eyes flickered and he sat down next to Steve, quietly staring into the darkness of the room. 

“War.” He said in such a serious voice, Steve couldn’t help but wanting to believe him. He really, really wanted to. But damn, that was one convenient scar. Maybe Howard saw the scar and misinterpreted the shadow of it, for a tattoo. But what if not. Steve knew, he could not take this risk, no matter how tight his pants felt at the moment. 

He took a deep breath, “I’m sorry for asking...”.   
When there was no answer, Steve noticed that something was off. He could see it in his eyes. 

And he was so close to getting laid.

One second after this thought, he started running to the front door. Jack yelled something and fear rose up in Steve as he heard him coming after him. The stairs were his way to freedom, he thought, as two more guys stepped in his way from the apartment one floor below him. 

Great. 

He slipped trying to escape them and fell the rest of the stairs to the next floor down.   
Steve analyzed his situation. Three guys behind him, a shitload of stairs and his asthma in front of him. It took him maybe two seconds to start running down the stairs, no matter how painful his fall had been.   
As he stumbled outside if the building, the fresh air refilled his power – not to the fullest, but enough to allow more running. 

Steve saw Howard looking at him with pure shock, as he passed his car, running away from the three bulky, huge-ass guys right behind him. Steve had to be fast. He had to ignore his asthma, his burning chest, his short breath, his tired legs – he knew, if they would get to him, before he found people to witness this, they would kill him. He had seen too much, god, he regretted doing Howard this favor. 

Just run, please! Steve begged his legs to work in his favor this one freaking time. He usually hated running away and he knew that he didn’t have the best life in the world, but he damn sure wouldn’t throw it away like that. Maybe Howard would help or maybe he would find someone to help or maybe he would end up hiding in some way. There were too many maybes and too little actual things to do. Steve had to think of something – quick!

An alley to his left seemed dark and full enough with trash for him to hide in there, so he pulled himself together and went for it, hearing the men behind him coming closer with every second. Without hesitating, he jumped between trash cans and old furniture, held a hand over his mouth to lower the volume of his breath.   
There was a pub nearby, he just now realized. 

Fuck. 

He would’ve been save there. But at least the music helped cover his sounds up and there was a fair chance that some of the visitors of that pub would get out there soon. He had no idea how late it was, but judging by his last look at a watch before shit went down, it had to be somewhere between 1 and 2 o’clock am. He saw the shadows of his pursuers coming closer, they lost speed trying to figure out if Steve hid himself somewhere or had ran down the alley. 

“Gentlemen.” A voice, sounding tipsy, scared the hell outta Steve. Luckily, the guy was talking to the three muscle-teers.   
“Searching for someone. Have you seen a skinny, blond guy around here?” That was Jack. Steve held his breath. It was over. The guy would tell them where he had hid and then he would have to fight them and get killed in a dirty alley far far away from home. The thought of starting to run again, appeared in Steves head, but now that he had allowed his body to calm down, the adrenaline had lost its effect and he felt like a car just ran over him a couple times.   
“What if I had seen someone?” The guy was out of Steves range, he could only hear his voice and judging by that the guy was not drunk enough to just tell them were Steve was.   
“Tell you what, man. If you tell us, we leave you alone. If not, we beat the hell out of you. Sounds good right?”   
“Nah, I don’t know.”  
Okay, maybe this guy was more wasted than Steve thought. Who in his right mind would say THAT to those three bodybuilders? Curiosity fell on Steve as he tried to catch a look at this guy, but it was too dark, he could only see a dark figure, leaning against the pub.  
Jack laughed, “what’s your name?” - “Why?” - “I like knowing who I beat up.” - “Well and I would like to see you try.” The shadow pushed himself off the wall and stepped into the light. Steves breath stopped and his tiny heart started pumping harder than he ever thought it could. 

There he was, his obsession, his muse, his nameless god – not even 20 yards separated them. 

Time stood still for Steve and when he fully realized the situation, his secret obsession started fighting Jack and his colleagues. One after one and yet, all three at once. He pushed Jack away from him, hammered a fist into the guts of the guy next to him and kicked his head to the ground as he slammed the heads of Jack and the remaining muscle-mountain together, leaving all three of them unconscious in a matter of seconds. 

“The name’s James.” the ex-soldier grinned at the defeated for a moment before looking in Steves direction.  
Whilst avoiding eye contact – as much as he wanted to – Steve freed himself out of his hiding spot and ran away. He felt the eyes of his obsession in his back, but he could not think right now. He just wanted to escape this situation. 

About five minutes later he stopped, his breath was heavy and his legs felt like cooked pasta. Like a film, the scene in that alley played over and over on replay


	5. Of a save return and a hot night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Steve finds back to Howard, he has to go home - thinking about what on fucking earth just happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: Yes (kind of)  
> \- Other: Slight stalking
> 
> Revised: yes

Oh god dammit, why would it have to be such a sexy name like James. Why not Maynard or Billy like Steves old high school bully? Why James?   
He whispered the name, fearing he could forget it. God the name sounded so good on his tongue, let alone how sexy it would sound if someone would moan it – great. Now he had a boner in the middle of the probably most unfitting situation ever. 

Walking back to where he assumed Howards car was standing, he desperately tried getting his thoughts back on track. As he walked down the alley where Jack lived, he wondered if James was alright. If he just left them there. Why he didn’t just told them ‘yeah, that guys over there, have fun!’.

Howards car was still there, together with about 3 police cars and two black limousines, from Howards work, Steve assumed. 

“Steve”, he had never heard Howard sounding so happy. “Hey Howard, surprised that I am not dead?” No matter how happy his friend was, Steve was still pissed about this. “You know, it was a little close like 3 times and I nearly vomited out my lungs, but why would you care right?”  
Howard shook his head and pulled Steve into a tight hug. “I am so sorry, pal. I am so sorry. So, so sorry.”

They stood like that for about 5 minutes. After he pulled away, Steve told Howard and his colleagues where to find Jack and the others (if they were still knocked out), listened to a colleague of Howard, called Natasha, telling him what a great job he did and got driven home by a nice officer.

It wasn’t until 5am in the morning, that Steve finally lay down in his bed, his head filled with a thousand thoughts, one of them very, very persistent.

James. 

What an attractive name for such an attractive guy. He shivered. It was warm in his flat, but somehow he had goosebumps and felt incredibly awful, yet good. There was this adrenaline rush, still somewhat pumping through his veins. 

He knew he wouldn't be able to sleep.

But he had to try it. 

About twenty minutes later he found himself cringing his sketchbook.   
He just wanted to see his obses – James – again. Although his drawings couldn’t stand up to the original. Especially the face. But somehow, Steve handled to find James in the drawing, his smile, the way his eyes squinted when he laughed. Just by imagining James muscles contracting with every step he made, every breath he took, every swing with the baseball bat he nailed, every highfive he gave his friends after a successful run – Steve felt his blood rushing, like never before. The heat of the summer rose up Steves head at made him dizzy. He lay back down, after taking a good stretch, with his sketchbook and his favorite kind of pencil. A 3B from the art-supplies-shop downtown.   
In his head the picture of James, casually leaning against the wall of the pub with a smirk Steve didn’t had the pleasure to see yet, formed pretty clearly. And so Steve began sketching. 

He started with the torso, he always started with the torso. A perfect male triangle neatly covered up with a long sleeve. Arms with perfect round curves. The strong, muscular neck with the two dog-tags hanging down loosely.   
Steve moved downwards, avoiding the face, as usual.   
The legs had to casually, but properly, lean on the wall, with a heavy shadow on them, since the light didn’t reach them that well. Legs were the easiest part for Steve, male legs in pants all looked, more or less, the same. But James thighs, he had given them the nickname ‘thighs of betrayal’, since they were almost illegally delicate, yet muscular and strong. 

Oh, what would Steve give, to see them exposed, rather than covered by either the typical Sunday-evening knee-long shorts or, as for this evening, black jeans. 

Shoes, right, he had shoes on. Leather shoes to be precise. Steve tried to remember their colour, but it was way too dark in that alley to see them, so he just shadowed them like black shoes and went back upwards.

The hair, oh the hair. Dark, kinda curly and not short, but not long. James always styled them to stand up lightly, but during those hot Sundays, on which Steve had watched him, single strands of hair often fell down his forehead.   
Last night, there was no such strand of hair, but Steve was a sucker for that piece of hair falling down so he added it under creative freedom and moved on the jawline. He drew small and simple ears, added shadows to the neck and then – then there was the face. The last missing piece. 

To avoid doing it, he enhanced the smoke of the cigarette, he added as well. James had smoked it, before beating those guys up.   
The light outside became so bright that Steve could switch off his bed light.

‘Just draw the face already Rogers.’ He said to himself. 

His hand was shaking as he started James eyes, slightly squinting, his perfect nose, his lips curled up to this kind of smile, he never wore when playing sports. It was more of a smirk really. 

As sexy and perfect Steve thought the result was, it – again – didn’t live up to the original.   
Also, flipping through his drawings, he saw a lot of smiles, but none of them seemed quite genuine. They were all different and Steve tried thinking back to a real smile of James, but it seemed impossible to think of a moment of pure joy. 

Then again, Steve didn’t even really knew James.   
He probably smiled genuine all the time, watching his pretty girlfriend. 

Steve looked at his book full of hopes and dreams, crushed by the weight of the thought of James being with a girl right now.   
Laying next to her in bed, whispering how pretty she was and how he saved the life of this skinny little guy today, who hid in the trash to take off, after someone else had dealt with the guys chasing him. His hand on her hip, tracing down her curves with his fingertips. 

Stop it, Steve! 

Halfway into making himself sad – and oddly horny – he noticed the sun crawling over the sky, telling him to let it go and sleep.

‘Gentlemen’

Go to sleep, Steve begged his brain.

‘What if I had seen someone?’

Tipsy, husky, dark.

‘Nah, I don’t know.’ 

‘Why?’

James had only spoken a couple of sentences, but the memory of them woke Steve up every time he tried sleeping.

‘Well, I would like to see you try.’

Why would he risk his life for a stranger. Okay, he was drunk, but still clear enough to deal with three guys at once.

‘The name’s James.’

At this point it was clear that he would not catch any sleep. Steve was sure about that. He lay on his back, looking to the left, seeing James smile. Did it matter if he was with a girl right now? Did it really matter? Steve had known about the fact, that he would never be with him from the start. 

Now, after James had saved his life, after he finally had heard the voice of his little god and after he actually had been (nearly) face to face with him – NOW he got sad? Now of all those times he could have gotten sad?

Steve pushed himself up and took a look at his book. At the very end of the sketchbook, he had drawn James, how he pictured him without a shirt. How the usually through clothing enhanced male triangle looked like without covering.   
He shivered as his hand reached down his pants, imagining is was James hand. He pressed his back on the wall and lay his head in his neck as he left out a soft moan.

Thinking about how sweet James probably moaned. 

His brain reminded him of all the times, he had seen James, covered in the light coat of sweat, glistering in the sunlight, laughing, fixing his hair with a quick motion, laying his hand on the shoulders of one of his friends as a sign of victory, running around, jumping after a Home Run, filled with joy, filled with excitement. 

Another moan filled Steves mouth.

He stroke his cock gently but precise – just the way he liked it. Up and down with a little motion to the sides, almost forming a circle motion.   
He went faster, thinking about how James licked his lips after tasting the salt of his own sweat. How he had sprinkled himself with water last week. 

Steve imagined sitting on top of James, kissing him, sharing the same breath, wetting each others lips.  
He moaned louder, knowing he was about to finish, as his thoughts travelled to that alley, where James had looked at him.   
Hopefully it had been to dark for James to actually see his face, Steve thought, or else he wouldn’t be able to watch him anymore.

As he climaxed, his eyes closed, his mouth staying open struggling to get enough air into his lungs to fully enjoy this moment. “James...”, Steve whispered in between the two last strokes of his hands. 

Holy shit.

Did he just.

Well, yeah, he did.

It sure as hell wasn’t the first time he masturbated to James, but he never knew his name.   
God moaning it felt so right, but so wrong at the same time. 

After laying in his bed for another half an hour, just thinking about everything, Steve got up and headed to the shower.   
It was going to be a hot day in Brooklyn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey I really hope you like the story so far :)  
> If there is anything you want to tell me (regarding mistakes I made or ideas you have) please leave a comment (I love comments so much!) :)


	6. Of… okay just fucking how did that happen?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stalker!Steve and Baseball!Bucky :D

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: yes

Sunday the 30th of July, 1947  
New York

He couldn’t help himself.   
Steve knew, how stupid this was, and how dumb and no matter how many synonyms for stupid one could find, they would all apply. 

These thoughts ran through his mind, as he sat himself down at his usual spot on Sunday afternoons, blinking heavily in the broad sunlight.   
But there was no game today.  
Steve waited and waited, but nobody showed up.

Confused and disappointed, but mostly sad he packed his stuff, as a familiar voice cut the silence.   
“Hey agent nerd.”  
Steve turned around and tried smiling at his friend, approaching from behind.  
“Coming from the physics-pro.”  
They both laughed and Howard sat himself down, just like Peggy did the week before.  
“What are you doing up here?” Steve asked nervously. “Meeting up with a friend, playing baseball.” - “Oh?” He was genuinely surprised, “are you doing that every week? Cause I’m usually up here drawing. I’m sure I would have noticed you.” Howard shook his head. “Nah, I’m just here cause someone called in sick.” Steve swallowed. 

Was it James? Did those thugs wake up and turned him into mashed potatoes? Oh god, please no. Why? Why was is him standing at this pub? Why not one just another ex-soldier drinking heavily on a Friday night. Oh god, what if James was an alcoholic, at this moment fading away in a coma caused by drinking too much after beating those guys up? What if, Howard and the police held him accountable for beating them up and he’s in prison for saving Steves life or he could be…

“Hey Howard! There you are! Sorry for being late, there was traffic… oh you already have company!” 

Steve had a really hard time not hyperventilating.   
There he was, the most gorgeous man in the world and he was standing right next to them. Howard pulled James into a hug and grinned at him. “No, no, he’s an old friend of mine!” James nodded and turned towards Steve.  
“Hey, I’m James.”  
“I know.”

Oh no.

James squinted his eyes and looked at Steve, who was stumbling and falling over his own tongue.  
“I mean, Howard here had already told me he was meeting you. Sorry that came out wrong.” He laughed nervously and ignored Howard, looking at him.   
“I’m Steve.” Good save. He actually felt kinda proud of himself. James was back to smiling and lightly touched Steves shoulder as he spoke. 

Oh boy. 

Howard and James both looked at him like they were expecting something. 

Rogers, FOCUS!

“Excuse me, I was just thinking. What did you say?” - “Is everything alright?” James looked concerned and even Howard was raising one eyebrow at him (which was his ‘I care about you’ look). Steve could slap himself for behaving so fishy. “Yeah, everything’s fine. I just, I feel a little dizzy, the heat probably, that’s all.” - “Well, I suppose it’s a no then?” - “What?” He hated his stupid brain for constantly drifting away. “You are not playing with us, right?” He finally got it and nodded. Thankfully, his excuse was successful and they talked to each other, rather than to him. 

God, was he stupid? He had the fucking chance to talk to James, to his obsession, his muse, his personal, little god – and there he was, heading to the bleachers like he was still in High School and had just passed on talking to the cool guys.

“Do I know you?” James voice in his ears brought him back from his thoughts again. Steve nervously began coughing and shook his head. “No, I don’t think so.” - “Are you sure?” James stopped him from walking and took a close look on Steve. Whose heart had a really bad time catching up. 

Shit.   
Shit.   
Shit.  
Shit.

He’d never been so close so James. Like, he could really SEE him for the first time. Every bump in the skin, every wrinkle under his eyes and at both sides of his mouth – laughing wrinkles, but also every crease on James forehead – coming from sorrow. Brown eyes gleaming as the sun was shining directly into them teased Steve, telling him to look into them, to lose himself in them and stubbles on his left cheek where he missed shaving this morning showing him that even his muse wasn’t perfect. 

“Hm, weird. I feel like I know you. Anyways, do you normally play baseball here? Maybe I know you from that.” They were back to walking, Steves legs tried not to embarrass him any further by failing him.   
“No, not really. I come here to draw sometimes. I would caught up my intestines if I tried playing baseball, trust me on that.”   
Howard chuckled behind them. Steve, again, tried ignoring it. He was pretty sure that Howard by now had caught up on Steves crush. It wasn’t really hard to tell, since he knew that Steve came here every Sunday.   
“Oh, you draw? That’s neat man, what do you usually draw?” 

You.

Of course he wouldn’t answer that, “I originally came up that place where you found me and Howard to draw the skyline, but I got distracted by the baseball players and use them for proportion practice.”

Why did he say that? 

“Did you ever draw me?” 

And there it was. The question Steve had never felt so horrified by before.

“Not that I can recall. But, it could be. From up there, everybody looks pretty much the same.” Oh the lies he told. His mother would have been so mad at him if she would’ve witnessed this.   
“I mean I could… you know. I’ll be sitting on the bleachers anyways.” WHAT WAS WRONG WITH HIM? How come, James was still walking next to him, instead of calling the police and reporting a stalker. God, why was he so awkward?

“That would be great oh my god, I’d feel honored!” 

What?

Was James blushing or was that the sun. The sun of course, Jesus, what was he thinking. 

“Great… than I will do that...” Steve felt how James squeezed his shoulder, as he left him standing at the fence to the bleachers. He didn’t really got, what just happened. He had permission to stare at James, from the tribune instead of the hill – for a whole game. 

Jackpot!

Steve focussed on James playing, he’d never seen him playing from such a short distance. But he played just as good as usual and Steve felt the pressure of drawing better than his sketches.   
Normally, he did about 20-30 sketches per game, today, he limited himself to about five. 

That was because,  
a) He didn’t want to look like a stalking psychopath and   
b) He worked out those sketches better, added more shadow and tried making the facial expressions as realistic as possible.

When James finished his rounds, Steve saw him loosely jogging towards the fence, casually jumping over it whilst still looking like a super model (seriously, sometimes life was just unfair) walking the steps up to place his fine ass right next to Steves.   
“Hey punk, how’s the drawing going?”  
“Punk?” Steve tried his hardest to not swoon right now.   
“Yeah, it fits you pretty well.”  
Steve snickered and showed his sketchbook to James, carefully holding both sides down, so that he couldn’t turn the pages. That would just end up in either seeing him about a hundred times playing baseball or about 50 times doing… well… other stuff.   
“Oh wow.” James eyes widened as he took a look at Steves drawings. “You are like the most talented person I’ve ever met!” Steve blushed and didn’t hesitate, as James took the book to really look. He wouldn’t flip the pages. He was no person to just do that. He respected him, Steve just now got that. He also just now got, that a hot, sweating James sat like two inches away from him, his leg was gently touching James and he even heard his breath calming down from the game he just finished.

“My face”, Steve got slammed back to reality, “you really got my face. I love that. The dynamic, the… the everything.” 

There was a perfect little pause, where nobody said something. It was just them, James admiring Steves drawings, Steve watching him trace the lines, carefully trying not to wipe or blur them. 

When Howard intervened, Steve actually got kinda angry for a couple seconds.

“What’cha doing boys?” Before Steve could say anything, James answered. “I’m admiring the talent of this guy over here. Did you know he could draw like that?” Howard nodded and sat down, next to them. “Yeah, you should see his apartment, man. He has like a thousand portraits and drawings and my favorite one is the one over the bed, you know which one right Steve?” Steve couldn’t do anything but to nod. “Yeah, no surprise that it’s your favorite. It’s Peggy...” GOD WHY DID HE SAY THAT? He bit his lip and watched Howards eyes go dark, just for a moment, but it was still noticeable for Steve. “Sorry pal… I wasn’t thinking...” 

James somehow felt that something was wrong, but he didn’t step in. That was until... 

“Peggy Carter? Damn, that’s one hell of a babe right there!”

Steve didn’t knew the guy who had just turned up behind them to – unwanted – join their discussion, but damn he got angry. Angry, that guys treated Peggy like a piece of meat instead of the princess she was.   
But again, James was faster. He stood up fast and gracefully like a cheetah on a hunt. Every muscle under complete control. “Miss Carter is a wonderful Lady and not a babe. Treat women with respect or catch yourself a blue eye.” 

Everyone suddenly went silent. 

The guy looked at James, like he was going to fight him, but that he turned around to walk away. 

“Thank you”, both Howard and Steve mumbled. James smiled at them and then slowly backed out, “gotta go, but we definitely have to hang out sometime”, Howard was about to respond, as James added, “I wanna see that portrait you two have been speaking about, okay Steve?”   
He was talking to him. He wanted to hang out with him, not with Howard. Steve felt extremely proud.   
“Yeah, sounds good. When do you have time…to…?” James was still walking backwards, but he stopped to think about that question for a couple seconds. “How does Tuesday sound? I could stop by around 5pm? What’s your address?” Steve felt unstable. “Sounds great, Falconlane 335, Apartment 207, fifth floor.” - “Great!” James smiled at Steve and he felt completely struck by that. There was that genuine smile he had been searching for. And it was directed to him. “See you then, James.” - “Bucky.” - “What? My friends call me Bucky. See ya punk.” 

And then he was gone, again jumping over the fence, picking up a small sports bag, walking away so casually. He always did things so casually. 

“Punk?” Howard grinned at him.   
“Shut up.” Steve smiled.   
“Where the fuck did you learn his name though?”  
Steve felt kind of bad lying, but he had to.   
“I picked it up watching the games. He’s a good player, they yell his name constantly out loud. But it seemed kinda weird telling him that.”

As Howard chuckled, Steve already had his mind drifting off again.


	7. Of new scars and new opportunities

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for a certain scene but it was just so funny :D Sorry! So sorry!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: yes

Tuesday the 2nd of August, 1947  
New York

Steve learned how to cook for himself at around age 8, when his father bailed on him and his mother and she had to work double shifts.   
But usually, Steve only cooked for himself, so there was no judgement when something was burned or didn’t taste good. But today, he had to impress with his skills.  
He still could not believe that this was happening.

As he pulled his lasagne out of the oven and left it on the counter to cool down. As he leaned on the counter, a sharp pain went through his hand. 

FUCK.

He accidentally touched the outside of the lasagne whilst leaning backwards. That was so unpleasant. His hand hurt so bad, he didn’t realize that his doorbell rang. Holding his arm under water, tearing up, swearing like a pirate in a shitty Broadway play he bowed his head down, took a couple of deep breaths and turned the water off. 

“Hi”, Bucky smiled widely as Steve opened the door. But his brows rose upwards immediately after he took a look at the sweating guy in front of him, who held his hand with his other hand, forcing himself to smile.   
“Jesus, are you okay?” He basically let himself in, taking Steves arm to take a look. “Have you burned yourself? Do I smell lasagne? Oh god, did you burn yourself whilst making lasagne for me? God, I feel so bad. Let me take a look please, I was in the military for about 3 years I have seen and taken care of quite some shit by now.” 

Steve couldn’t help but smile over the distressed guy, blabbering his mind out like Steve usually did. Although he had quite some experience with medicine (due to his chronic illnesses) he happily showed Bucky where his medical supplied were stored and let him place his ass on a kitchen chair.   
Bucky seemed kinda reserved and cold at first, but once he actually talked, Steve could see what a puppy he was. 

“Wow, you’ve got quite a collection here”, Bucky said, after opening the case with bandages, syringes, pills and other stuff Steve needed, in case he got sick. Which happened quite often. “Yeah, I tend to get sick a lot, asthma n shit.” Bucky didn’t seem to really think about what Steve just said, which was weird. Usually, people tended to feel sorry for him or ask questions about his health.   
“Seems like a pretty bad burn.” James mumbled whilst carefully dripping some water, mixed with something for disinfection on the wound.   
Steve nodded, “hurts like a motherfucker. I hope the lasagne is worth it, though.” The ex-soldier was still on his hand, “oh, it will be worth it, just because you cooked it.” When Steve looked up, he saw James going slightly red, just a quarter of a shade, but he noticed it.   
“Last time someone cooked for me was before the war.” Steve felt bad, Bucky shouldn’t have to explain himself.   
“It’s okay, I usually cook for myself only. It’s nice to have someone else being excited about the food I make.” He wondered how Bucky could maintain such a good physique (he could only guess, but Buckys arms and what one could see through the tight long sleeve from Friday seemed definitely muscular) while eating take out and precooked meals. 

“I really do hope it’s good though. I came all the way here from Hawkstreet.” Steve rose an eyebrow, “Hawkstreet… West-Brooklyn?” James grinned at him and nodded. “I live there, y’know?” Now Steve began grinning, “that’s not even a two minutes walk. Are you shitting me? You literally live around the corner?” - “Seems like it.” They sat there for a couple of moments in silence. Well it’s sure as hell wasn’t silent in Steves head. 

All the times he thought of James, he drew him out of memory, he traced the lines of older drawings – hell all the times he jacked off to him – he was less that a block away from him. 

God just the thought… No. Not now. 

“There we go, all set up.” James patted the bandage on Steves hand lightly, concerned to hurt him. “Now where’s the lasagne at?” - “Right here!” Steve dug himself out of his thoughts and hoped to god he didn’t go all red.   
He went to a shelf to get plates. “Hey, can I have a glass of water?” Bucky asked shyly. “Sure thing, let me just...”, he tried reaching up the shelf and failed. Being 5’’3’ sure as hell had it’s shitty moments. “Sorry, I usually drink out of cups”, he tried explaining. But Bucky already leaned upwards the shelf to grab the glass himself, revealing his lover back like a canvas for Steves imagination. Jesus Christ, he had back dimples. 

Back. Dimples. 

Steve, focus!

He pointed at the fridge, “there is something to drink in there if you want something cool and judging by the temperatures outside you probably do.” Bucky nodded thankfully and opened the refrigerator. Meanwhile, Steve set the table and – carefully – placed the lasagne on the small kitchen table. As he cut into, it still steamed, even after cooling down for several minutes now. 

“Smells great.” Bucky sat himself down and waited for Steve to put some on their plates.   
As they dug in the noodles, there was that silence again. But Steve felt, like it was a comfortable silence. There was no talking pressure, just a calm, peaceful moment of not producing sounds. 

“I’ll do the dishes”, Bucky said right after Steve finished (he took way longer to eat than Bucky, who ate, like his last meal had been a while back). Steve cared and wanted to ask, but he also didn’t want to push Bucky. He seemed happy now, what was going on in his private life was none of Steves business.   
“Cool”, Steve shrugged and stood up. “But first”, Bucky grinned, “show me your drawings!” 

Steve felt a little light headed, leading Bucky the way to his bedroom. It wasn’t a separate room, but a wall stood in between the living room / kitchen space and the place his bed stood.   
“So here are you sleeping.” 

Yeah… sleeping…

Steve felt a slight shudder, there was something unbelievably sexy in having James in his bedroom. No matter why.  
“Yeah, my flat is nothing special, but it is mine!” Bucky nodded in agreement and smiled, “I wish I had my own apartment! But living with someone is also kinda nice, and Nat is the bomb! You have to meet her one day!”

There is was.   
Steve had just waited for the girlfriend to appear.

He swallowed dry.  
“Nat? She sounds nice! How long have you two been a thing?”

He heard Bucky cough heavily, “Jesus Christ me and Nat? No, no, no! We just live together, I’ve known her for at least 2 years now! She’s dating Sam. Jesus Christ me and Nat…. I have to tell her that you thought that! She’ll think it’s hilarious! You’ve GOT to meet her, you two are so much alike!” Steve had to bite himself on the tongue to keep himself from smiling.  
“You seem so shocked that I thought that”, he sat himself down on his own bed and looked up to Bucky. “Yeah ‘course I am shocked. I’m gay. Holy cow Jesus, did you draw all of these? They look like photographs!” 

All Steve heard was a high pitched tone in his ears, as he sat on his bed, the smile slowly backing down from his face. 

‘I’m gay.’

He admitted that, like admitting to smoking or to jog every Sunday morning.

“Steve? Are you listening?” He nodded slowly, trying to keep a straight face. Bucky sighted and crossed his arms. The look on his face changed from overly excited to guilty and almost fearful. “Listen, are you reacting like this because I said I’m gay? Cause if you don’t feel comfortable around me than I can just leave and it’s perfectly fine. My dad wasn’t cool with that either.” Steve just stared at the wall for a couple seconds, before he looked over to Bucky. And Bucky stared back.

Steve didn’t knew where he got the energy from, but all of a sudden he felt how he pushed himself on Bucky, like he did this a least a thousand times in his dreams. Nearly jumping to get to his lips, he felt Buckys hands on his thighs, slowly lifting him up, so that he could reach him better.   
“You are so small, it’s ridiculously funny, u know that?” - “Less talking, more kissing”, Steve mumbled as an answer. 

Steve shuddered and felt reality, forcing its way back into his head. 

“Steve?”

His thoughts broke down in a matter of seconds.

“If this is about me being gay...” - “No, no I’m down for that… I mean I… I’m cool with that. I just got lost in a thought.” When he looked at Bucky, he saw that his friend was biting down a grin. “You do that a lot, hm? Daydreaming. I saw you drifting away in your thoughts Sunday at least five times.” Steve shrugged and tried smiling. 

He really got to be more careful. A dirty daydream with someone standing right next to him? Jesus, what if he’d said anything or worse? 

“So you like my drawings?” His hands were shaking as he looked over to Bucky nodding heavily. “Well, that’s very convenient!” Bucky rose an eyebrow and leaned his head to the left, “why is that convenient?”

Steve took a deep breath. “Well, you like my drawings and it isn’t very often that I actually have someone interested in my art to talk to, and because I had a little time on my hands, I thought that… oh fuck it I just show you.” 

He reached behind his desk and pulled out a canvas, 15×20 inches. He heard Bucky breathing in hard. “Holy shit Steve… is that me?” The canvas showed a smiling Bucky, showing his hair back, fixating the viewer of the painting. The arms exposed, natural light shining from the back, letting the little hairs on his arms glow, as well as the scars. The dog-tags around his neck swinging to the left. Beard-stubbles throwing shadows on his face and a dynamic, that makes the painting seems as real as the actual Bucky standing next to him.  
Steve nodded and chuckled, “and it is for you.”

Bucky was speechless. Like, legit speechless.  
“Man, you could sell that for a lot of money… why would you give that to someone like me?” Steve scratched his head, “okay first of all, it’s oil on canvas and that shit only sells if you have the right name for it. Second off, I didn’t paint it and then decided to give it to you. I painted it for you!” - “Why though? I mean, okay, I like your drawings… but that must’ve taken you at least 10 hours!” - “23...”, Steve mumbled, “but yeah it wasn’t completely out of charity. I wanted to ask if you maybe want to meet...”, he couldn’t even finish his sentence. “Sure.”

Well, that was easy. But Steve was unsure if Bucky knew what he meant. He wanted to draw him for one of his classes. Not just hang out. “I mean like-” - “When and where? Tomorrow? Till when do you work or have school? I have the Wednesday off.” Steve nodded slowly. “Do you know the little art school at Gardenspalace?” He felt like something on James face wanted to pull a grimace. “You want to draw me, ah yes… sure um yeah, I know the school! I’ll be there, just tell me when!” - “Yeah, it’s for this school project and an ex-soldier would be perfect! Around 2pm? I’ll catch ya on the entrance!”

“Hey, can I use your bathroom?” Bucky smiled shyly and followed Steves lead to the small bathroom next to the main door. 

He grinned and leaned on the wall next to the door. Bucky said yes! He said yes! And he wanted to meet him again tomorrow! Steve couldn’t process all the luck he’s had in the last week. The fact that Bucky wanted to meet up without knowing it was for art purposes made him even happier. It felt like he… what on earth?

He couldn’t understand much, but he clearly heard Bucks voice through the bathroom door. Was he talking to himself? 

He snapped back, as he heard the flush and a moment later the sink. Bucky came out, heading for the kitchen, doing the dishes. After that, they sat together, talking, laughing and it felt kinda normal. Kinda natural. As if they had known each other for forever. 

When Bucky left, the apartment felt even emptier than usual. 

But he had tomorrow to look forward to.


	8. Of daydreaming and hard realities

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The drama everyone has been waiting for.  
> No?  
> Just me? Well it's there anyways.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: DRAMA
> 
> Revised: yes

Wednesday the 3rd of August, 1947  
New York

He was a sweating little shit. It was an extremely hot afternoon and Steve hated everything about it. He hated the way it made his lungs swell and his bones heavy. But as he made his way down to the entrance of his art-school, he felt better that he ever believed he could feel on a day like this. The school was nearly empty, there was only him and some teachers in the office having some formal get together. 

The room he prepared had two chairs in the middle, one for Bucky, one for himself and a mirror behind his own chair, so that Bucky could watch him paint. It’s going to be a while, since his paintings always took a couple of hours.

Opening the front door, he wasn’t expecting Bucky to already be there. But there he was, standing outside smoking. “Oh hey, how are you?” He flashed a heartwarming smile at Steve and came closer, until Steve started coughing uncontrollably. “Woah, holy shit are you okay?” Steve waved his arms and pointed at the cigarette. His view was blurry, but he saw Bucky immediately letting go of the cigarette. “I am so sorry...”, the concern in Buckys voice nearly broke Steves (coughing) heart. “It’s alright [cough] Asthma [cough] I already mentioned [cough] it. It happens.” 

They stood in that alley for another good minute, before Steve had regained control over his lungs. Bucky patting his back (which didn’t really helped, to be honest, it kinda made things worse) and constantly murmuring comforting stuff, as if he tried calming down a child. When Steve was finally able to maintain a steady breath again, they went inside and Steve showed Bucky the room.

“We’re pretty much all alone. If you want to listen to music, I have headphones. There is this mirror behind me, if you wanna watch the progress and… well, that’s pretty much it.”  
“I didn’t know that it’s a shirtless kinda thing.” Bucky walked from one side of the room to the other, looking at the other paintings, Steves observing eyes in his back. “I mean, it’s kind of a non-mandatory deal… oh.” Bucky already had taken off his shirt in a swift motion, “I don’t mind.” 

Steves mouth was dropped open. 

Above Bucky left arm, there were about 10-15 light scars and 2-3 deep scars, all the way down to the beginning of his slight six-pack. He looked marvelous without a shirt, but damn, those scars. 

“We drove back from a mission when a grenade exploded right next to the car. Got half of the window in my arm and breast-region.”

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to stare...”  
Bucky took his time to answer. “It’s alright, you kinda have to stare to draw me anyways, right? Besides, I’m still pretty hot.” He watched Steve breaking out in sweat, laughing nervously. “I’m kidding. Do you want me in a pose?”

Steve blinked a couple of times. Was Bucky fucking with him? Was that some kind of joke between him and Howard? Did they set him up because they knew that he had a crush on Bucky? He needed a couple of seconds. 

“Imma gonna get some supplies, be right back, make yourself comfortable and think of any pose you’d like.” His voice was shaking so hard, he knew exactly that Bucky wasn’t buying half of what he said. After he closed the door behind him, he began running as fast as his poor lungs could take it. Arriving in the men’s bathroom, he checked if anyone was in the stalls, busted inside one of the cabins and tried breathing normally.   
Everything turned on him as he looked down at his own hands. 

He knew. Bucky knew. Right? The way he behaved. Steve felt so stupid.

About 2-3 minutes later he came out of the stall, washing his hands and face with cold water. 

“Hey your back. Listen, I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable. I was joking. I’m extremely sorry if you...” Steve cut Bucky off. “It’s alright Buck. I’m fine. Actually, I need to say sorry, it’s not because of you. I just, I’m just having a couple of weird days and… I was looking forward to today and honestly, I don’t even know what’s going on with me. I feel kinda paranoid.”

Steve felt relieved and mutilated at the same time.   
“Let’s just forget that I freaked out and get to work.” He sat himself down and was extremely happy for the piece of canvas he could hide behind. He still could not believe what was happening. There he was, eyeballing the most beautiful man on earth, freaking out, overthinking everything, constantly afraid someone knew.   
Bucky admitting he was gay made it better. Steve still felt terrible, because Bucky was probably dating someone from a damn catalogue with like muscles n shit. That, plus the fact that he still hadn’t told Bucky about him being bisexual, which caused Bucky to constantly apologize for making him uncomfortable. It was kinda funny. But kinda terrible. 

He began working and for the first two hours Bucky watched him through the mirror, sketching, shading, preparing. After that, Steve noticed that his model became more and more restless. His eyes flew over the other students' paintings, over and over again and when they hit the four hour mark, Steve couldn’t take it any longer.  
“Break?” He asked, already standing up and stretching his legs. Bucky nodded and stood up as well. “God, how late is it?” He asked, looking absolutely exhausted from one second to the other.   
“6pm”, Steve yawned and watched Bucky scratching the back of his head.   
“You look like shit”, he said dryly and chuckled, as Bucky flipped the finger on him and pulled a face. “Feel like shit as well. We have a construction zone right outside our flat and I have woken up every morning for three weeks at half past 7. In other words: Hell on earth.”   
Steve had ‘you could stay with me’ on his tongue, but beat it down. Bucky had other friends to stay with if he wanted to. 

They took off for coffee and when they came back, Steve returned to his canvas and Bucky groaned loudly. “How much longer?” He asked.   
“A couple hours. I only need a rough drawing, nothing with fancy details. Otherwise, it would take way longer!”  
Bucky moaned and pulled faces, but he managed to hold up for another full two hours. A quarter past 8pm Steve wrapped it up and showed Bucky the result. He seemed happy, but tired as shit.   
“Can’t you crush on a friends place? You look like literal trash.”   
“Can’t. Natasha’s staying with Sam, Howard is married with a child, there is no way in hell that I’m going to crush his happy little family and apart from that – well I’m kinda new in this town, I haven’t lived here for years. And I only know the guys I work with and the baseball-players, none of them well enough to-” Steve cut him off. “You can stay at my place.” Bucky seemed kinda unhappy with that. “Look, I didn’t mean to trigger that. You don’t have to give me any charity.” Steve shook his head, “I’m not at all giving you any charity. How long is that construction zone going on?” Bucky shrugged, “I don’t know. One week, two? Something like that. And you have school, you don’t want some stranger alone in your flat.” Steve smiled as he pinned his painting to the others, he looked for a nice pencil to sign it. “The school closes on Friday for the summer, I have an awful lot of free time watching ur ass...”, he blushed, “sorry that came out wrong.”

Bucky seemed amused, “did it?” Steve felt how a cold shiver wandered down his spine. 

‘He knows, they are making fun of you!’ – This thought really messed with him. 

He just hoped Bucky wouldn’t notice. “What do you mean?” Steve turned his back on Bucky, pretending to ask this as a casual question.   
That was, until he felt Bucky hand on his lower back.   
What on earth, he had a hard time breathing and a hard one within seconds, but that was obvious to Bucky. Snickering in Steves neck. 

This was a daydream, Steve was completely sure. It had happened before and he had absolutely no control over this. At this point he was just hoping the real Bucky wouldn’t notice that he had driven off again.  
“What is happening?” He asked breathlessly, as Buckys hand moved forward to his stomach. “You remember your little daydream yesterday?” Steve was pretty sure Bucky was smirking and all of a sudden, he was not so sure if this was a daydream anymore. The muscles of the Buckys upper body felt pretty nice on Steves back and he felt like he was going to faint. The only thing holding him up was his faith that this was going to end in a couple seconds and Bucky.   
As Steve slowly nodded, he felt Buckys head on his shoulder whispering: “You moaned my name...” 

There was a fight in Steves head whether this was a daydream – this thought, however wasn’t really strong – or a game Bucky was playing. His biggest fear – Bucky knowing about his crush – quite literally punched him in the stomach.   
When he heard Buckys words, everything started turning and Steve felt like his head was exploding.   
“I should leave… I… I’m gonna…. I’m not even going to ask you why the hell you came today. I’m just... it’s..”, it was hard finding the right words, swallowing down tears and anger and fear and humiliation. He took a deep breath and controlled his shaking hands, “Is this some kind of game for you?”  
For the first time since he had turned his back on Bucky he actually look up to his face.

What he saw surprised him.

There was no fun, no evil, there was just this look.  
“You think I’m making fun of you?” Bucky seemed honestly hurt. “All those dumb ass hints I dropped on you in the last days, all those times I brought back the fact that I’m gay hoping for a reaction other than you blushing and turning your back on me. YOU LITERALLY MOANING OUT MY NAME LOUD AND YOU THINK… I nearly gave up, thinking you made fun of me yesterday and now you tell me you tHINK I’M MAKING FUN OF YOU?”  
Steve didn’t really knew what to do. 

All he could’ve thought about since last Sunday was how he may be humiliated. He never thought about it that way.   
He never thought that Bucky might think that he… oh god. What on earth had he done?   
“You are so busy feeling bad about yourself that you couldn’t even think twice about your actual behavior, right? Well, let me tell you what you did over the last couple days. First, you talk normally to me, give me this amazing painting, ask me to model for you – whilst constantly ignoring my hints. And then you tell me I could stay with you. What did you think that would trigger? I tried SO HARD. So. Hard. I had a freaking panic-attack in your bathroom. And you literally didn’t thought about all of this. You know what, I am done trying. I am so fucking tired of this. If you are not interested, fine, tell me. But don’t you dare treat me like I don’t have feelings.”

After Bucky had spoken, he took his shirt and left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there, please don't kill me for this chapter.  
> I just wanted to thank y'all for over 850 reads/views and over 50 kudos and over 20 comments. 
> 
> If you enjoy this story or find any mistakes please leave a comment! I am not a native speaker and I wrote this chapter in a hurry (I have an exam tomorrow) so there are probably some mistakes (and also I enjoy comments way more than I should).


	9. Of alcohol and bad news

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All the single dramas, all the single dramas, all the single dramas - put your hands up!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: MORE DRAMA
> 
> Revised: yes

Friday the 5th of August, 1947  
New York

There was a knock on Steves door.

Steves hair was a greasy mess, he hadn’t showered in two days. His teachers tried contacting him, they’ve had a big party to end the semester and when Steve didn’t show, it took them about half an hour to drive to his apartment to check on him.   
His favorite teacher (and secretly the biggest fan of his art) Mr. Coulson, already had to drive him to the hospital, when Steve had a hardcore asthma-attack half a year ago.   
So after telling them (through the door) that he was not dying, he shut down completely – not eating, not showering, not caring at all.

The voice of Bucky in his head messed with him. 

He sounded like a wounded animal.

He sounded so vulnerable.

Steve had been so paranoid and self-conscious, he didn’t even lose half a thought about how Bucky might feel towards him. Revisiting their meetings, it was kind of obvious that he was flirting, but back in the moment – oh god Steve had never felt so bad.

Without any social contact, Steve had felt better the last couple days, that he thought he would. He knew he needed to calm down. He knew he needed time for himself – although his egocentric mind was the reason all of this shit went down like this after all.   
But he just NEEDED to be alone.

And now there was this knock.

At first, he just drank. Drank all the beer in his fridge, all the wine in his cupboards – even the fine shit he had saved for a special occasion. His body could not take much alcohol, but he tried his best ignoring that.   
After there was no alcohol left, he began drawing like a maniac. Drawing Bucky, himself, happy couples, burning the drawings, burning down his sketchbook – trying to rescue it just to burn it down again out of frustration. 

And now there was this knock.

What broke Steve was not the fact, that Bucky was gone before they even had a chance. No, that was frustrating, but Steve was used to not getting people he desired.  
The thing that made him feel the way he felt was that he – Steve Grant Rogers – always had been so proud of his mother for raising him to be honest, modest, kind, open hearted. But ever since she had gone sick, unable to move without help, her morals had been a whisper in Steves head but nothing more.   
He had lost everything she taught him. His personality was broken and shit and he had hurt someone because of how much of an asshole he had become. 

And now there was this knock.

‘Could be anybody, really’, Steve thought. But that was kind of untrue, Howard would’ve already opened the door trying to maintain infos about Steves interest in Bucky by blackmailing him with pizza. His mom would talk to him through the door asking him why he wasn’t answering – if she would be able to get out of the hospital on her own. Bucky was unlikely to show, Natasha from Howards work seemed nice, but why the fuck would she be standing in front of that door and Peggy – well it could be Peggy. 

Fuck. It could only be Peggy. And she was the only human being out there that might actually could help him get over this. Sighing, he pulled on a fresh shirt, tried avoiding the mirror – he most definitely did not want to know how he looked right now – and opened the door.  
It was Peggy.   
But she didn’t notice that Steve looked like shit. She was a mess herself.

“Peg, what’s going on?” Her eyes were red and she looked ten years younger without the makeup, as she walked inside and threw herself on the couch. “Steve,” her voice was small and unusually high. She looked at Steve with her brown puppy eyes and he knew it was serious.

“Peggy, tell me what’s wrong!” He began seriously worrying. “I, I had this bump on my chest for the last couple weeks, thinking it was a bruise or something and I never got to the doctor about it because – well you know how I procrastinate – but today in school there was this heat and I… I fainted, I think, I mean I can’t really remember… and when I woke up”, Steve grabbed her hands. Thoughts running through his head. Repeating the word ‘bump’, hoping, praying that this was not what it seemed like. “Peggy, what is it.” 

She fought back tears, ramming her nails in his palms, whispering, so quietly Steve almost could not hear her. 

“Steve, I have cancer.”


	10. Of exes and roofs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Introducing to you: A sick Peggy, a worried Howard and a surprised Steve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: Yes  
> \- Other: Hospitals, panic-attacks
> 
> Revised: yes

“What… what do you mean you have cancer?” Steve swallowed dryly. He felt bad for thinking about Bucky, when Peggy had REAL problems and he felt bad for thinking about how bad he felt. Pushing his character issues aside, he put his arm around Peggy and held her. 

“What do you want to do now? Do you have to go to the hospital? What stage is it in?” He felt bad for asking so many questions, but he needed more information to help. “I go first thing tomorrow and I don’t know the stage, but my doc said it looks pretty bad. God Steve I’m so scared!” Her body was shaking as she broke down again.

His stomach turned, but he nodded. “Okay, have you packed your bag?” She shook her head. “Okay”, Steve lifted her head up and looked in her eyes as he spoke, “listen Peg. I know this is shit but you’re going to need a bag and some supplies. How about we drive to your place, pick up some stuff, after that we come back here, you take a nice hot shower and we snuggle up on the sofa. Tomorrow I will drive you to the hospital and stay there with you as long as you need me to stay.” 

When Peggy slowly started nodding, Steve stood up and held his hand open for the car keys, which Peggy took out of her backpack to hand to him.   
Right before they left the apartment, Peggy took Steves hand and kissed him on the cheek, “thank you Steve. You don’t even know how precious you are...”

Steve swallowed dryly – again. 

If Peggy knew how rotten his personality had become over the last year, she would’ve never come to him for help.

Monday the 8th of August, 1947  
New York

Steve knew he shouldn’t have told Howard. But three days alone in hospital with Peggy really got on his nerves and even though he knew that he was being selfish again, he just could not be in a hospital without thinking about all the time he had spent in one. First with his mother at his side, later with him on his mother's side.   
He just couldn’t.   
He knew that.  
And he knew that Peggy knew that.  
But no matter what she said, he would not leave her alone.  
So he called in Howard.

A pillow hit his head. Hard. 

“Ouch! What the...” - “YOU TOLD HOWARD? YOU COMMANDED MY EX TO THIS HOSPITAL?” - “I was trying to help you! I can’t leave you alone in here! Not until we have more info about your cancer and that could take up to two weeks! So yeah, I told Howard! He’s outside.” 

Peggy looked at him, her eyes were beaming so hard, he was afraid they would shoot lasers at him.” He ducked, just in case there were going to be more pillows or other things – anything could turn into ammunition in Peggys hands – flying towards his head. 

Last evening when Peggy was sleeping, Steve was finally able get out of the hospital for a couple of hours, taking the tram to Howards place, ringing him and Maria out.   
“Hey Maria, you look marvelous”, he kissed her cheek and watched Howard tense up as he looked over to him. “Howard, do you have a second?” - “Maria, I’ll be right back inside.” They sat down on the stairs in front of Howards house.  
“So is this about you not talking to me for the last week? I mean, shit okay, I messed up, but when we met last Sunday I thought you were alright again and after all you and James seemed to...” Steve sighed in pure frustration. “Don’t mention him, please. No, no I’m not mad at you. Actually, you are probably going to become mad at me. But I really don’t know anyone else to talk to.”   
Now Howard seemed concerned rather than fearful, but Steve could also see some kind of relief behind his eyes. 

“Peggy has cancer Howard, and I know you don’t like to talk about her, but...” Howards hands curled up into tight fists and all colors vanished from his face. “Thank you for telling me”, he said quietly. “Will you go check on her? Please. I really don’t want to leave her alone right now, but I can’t stay in this hospital.” - “I know Steve, after everything that has happened in there. I know you still feel bad about your mother, but-”, he stopped as he saw the look on Steves face. “Nevermind. I’ll stop by tomorrow. But Steve, tell me one thing, why did you react so badly when I mentioned Bucky?” Steve didn’t really knew how Howard made the transition from his ex-girlfriend with cancer to a friend of his, so he just shrugged at him. “It just didn’t work out.” He tried not thinking about that now. “Listen, I better get back to Peggy. See you tomorrow.” Howard nodded and turned around. But before Steve could get away Howard called him back, “oh and Steve?” – “Yeah?” – “Maybe it’s for the better that you didn’t deepen the friendship with Bucky…” Steve shrugged again, walking away – this time for good – thinking about what Howard just said. Why would he say that? Howard was friends with Bucky, so naturally it would be better for all of them to get along, right?

The door opened slowly and Howard stepped in, bringing Steves thoughts back to reality.

“Steve, could you leave us for a second?” He said, fixating Peggy with an apologizing glance. “Peg… why did I had to hear about this from Steve?”   
Her answer came too late for Steve, he already had closed the door behind him on his way out. 

Steve almost sunk down immediately. He felt so weak – it was crazy what hospitals still could do to him. Even after all those years. He held his eyes closed, just trying to breathe.

When he opened his eyes again, all his effort went to trash.

On the bank right in front of him there he was. The one thought he hadn’t allowed himself to have for the last 3 days. Bucky.   
One hand on the bank, the other reached out to him – half sitting half standing, as if he was just about to check if Steve was alright. The second Steves eyes opened, his face went white and he backed off immediately – still looking worried. 

“Oh hey, didn’t see you there...” Steve had absolutely no time to think about their awkward situation, as he literally was about to faint. 

“Are you okay?” 

Steve had about a hundred ironic jokes on his tongue – but not enough air in his lungs to articulate them. Also, Bucky did seem distressed by this situation and Steve didn’t want to stress him out more.   
This was a horrible, awkward situation and Steve couldn’t wait to feel shitty about it – but first: AIR. 

He waved his arms around and just hoped that Bucky would get the hint. It took him painfully long, but as Steve fell down on his knees, he finally got behind the idea of helping him.   
Before Steve could do anything about it, Bucky stood up, pulled Steve up his arms and legit carried him to the nearest source of air – which turned out to be the roof, since they were in the 10th floor and there was a staircase leading up there about five rooms away. 

Him in Buckys arms was beyond awkward and even more so because he couldn’t breathe. Both of them felt stupid and weird.  
But Steve still enjoyed every second of it.  
He knew he shouldn’t… but still. 

As they stumbled on the roof, Bucky let Steve down and Steve just… breathed. God, it was such a nice feeling to breathe.   
When he calmed down, he saw the questions in Buckys face. “What happened, man? You came out of that room at boom – gone. I mean, shit, do you need a doctor or something?” Steve just looked at him, eyes squinting, asking himself if this guy was even real. Bucky legit looked (and most of the time behaved) like a threatening, cold person – not that Steve couldn’t understand the cold looks on his face after what happened less than a week ago between them – but on the inside, he was like a concerned puppy that just wanted to help.

And he had hurt that puppy.

“I’m fine… listen if you don’t want to be up here with me that’s fine. You came here with Howard, I’m sure Peggy doesn’t mind you being in her room.   
Buckys face pulled a grimace and his left hand massaged his nose-bridge. “Pal, you are so stupid I swear to god...” - “I’m not stupid! I’m just saying that I would understand it if you’d feel uncomfortable. That’s all.” 

Bucky didn’t answer that, but he stayed and secretly, Steve was happy about that.

“My mom used to take me to this hospital whenever I was sick – which was about 90% of my childhood.” Bucky looked up. “So that’s why you feel uncomfortable here? Amazing how you managed to stay in here for the last days”, when Steve rose his eyebrows, Bucky added, “Howard told me that you wanted to stay with Peggy.” 

“Me being here as a kid is not the only reason why I panic every time I’m in this hospital.” Steve said quietly. He didn’t knew why he said that. Steve had never told anyone else (except for Peggy and Howard) about his mom and what happened to her. Also, the fact that he didn’t really knew James that well and that last time they’d met they kind of made out just to hurt each others feelings 5 seconds after that, lead him to the conclusion that opening up to him really made no sense at all. But he felt like he could trust Bucky.   
Bucky wasn’t pushing about the information. He just looked at Steve like he could work any coming situation, like he would be there for him, no matter if Steve would actually explain himself now or not.  
“My mom got very sick and lay in here for about 5 years.”   
“Is she...”, Bucky seemed afraid to ask the question.  
“Dead? No, she’s…, well, I wouldn’t use the word ‘alive’. She doesn’t even know what’s going on around her.”

They were back to silence. In some way, Steve had missed this special silence between them. But he felt the need to clear up the air.  
So he leaned himself next to Bucky on the wall and thought about how to apologize.

“Bucky”, he began quietly, “I am so sorry.” When Bucky groaned he added, “I know you don’t want to hear that, but you also have no idea how sorry I am. I was so stuck in my own problems that I didn’t notice that you dropped hints and… and I hurt you by trying not to get hurt. Now, I don’t know how you feel about all of this, but I think you are amazing and don’t deserve any of this shit.”

He looked over and saw the ice blue eyes of Bucky searching for eye contact.   
“Are you finished?”  
Steve nodded.  
“Good.”

Bucky pushed himself off the wall and walked towards to door. Steve exhaled sharply, feeling horrible, but also relieved. At least now he knew what was going on in between them. He fucked up and that was okay.   
He looked at his feet, waiting for the door to fall down behind Bucky so that he could begin to cry. After about two minutes he looked up, the door was still open. Bucky was holding it open, staring into the stairwell like he was thinking really hard about something. When he noticed Steve starring at him, he looked over (causing a shudder all over the Steves body cause damn, that stare was intense).

“Oh fuck it.”

He slammed the door shut and almost ran over to Steve, kissing him so hard Steve almost had another asthma-attack. Within seconds Bucky pushed Steve against the wall, lifting him up, holding him there, tightly captured in between the wall and Buckys body.  
Steve was pretty sure that none of them knew exactly what was going on, but to be honest he didn’t gave half a fuck. 

He pressed his lips in Buckys neck, finally exploring all those muscles he drew, breathing in the very best medicine against asthma – the scent of a hot, heavy breathing Bucky. He pushed him away to take off his shirt – forgetting that he was kind of floating in the air – falling down almost dropping on his knees. He reached up to pull Buckys shirt up, inhaling so sharply on those exposed muscles, the air almost hurt his throat.   
Bucky slightly backed off when Steve touches the scars on his arm, but Steve just pulled him closer again, kissing every inch he could find. The sound of Bucky moaning was the best thing in the world and Steve got rock hard just hearing that. He pressed his light skinned, small body against Buckys and almost cried out loud as Bucky slid his hand down Steves pants.   
“God, Bucky, do you want to kill me?” He whispered against Buckys chest, shuddering from every touch of James hand against his cock.   
Bucky pulled down Steves pants in one swift motion – answering Steves question with that. Steve however, managed to pull himself together, opening Buckys pants, pulling them down as well. They kissed again, tangled by their pants around their ankles, causing them to fall down pretty quickly.   
Steve couldn’t help but laughing as he was laying on top of Bucky, on the roof of a hospital, making out. His laughter turned into screams as Bucky wrapped his hands around both of their dicks, pushing them together. Steve had – up to this point – his hands on the left and right side of Bucky, holding himself up as well as he could. But well, that didn’t work out anymore and he whined in pure lust, biting himself down on Buckys lower lip hard enough to draw blood. Which he licked up, kissing the little wound apologizing. But Bucky didn’t give a shit, he was too busy moaning, kissing and nibbling on Steves earlobe and still jerking both of them off at the same time – talking about multitasking.   
Steve ached, his back when he came, dropping completely on Bucky as he ran out of any energy he had left up to this point. Bucky gave himself one-two more strokes before he came as well looking up to Steve, both panting. 

“That was… unexpected...”, Steve chuckled as he rolled himself off James. 

They lay there for another couple moments before standing up, dressing themselves in complete silence, before Bucky opened the door and ran down the stairs. A little light headed, Steve followed him. Unsure what was going on.   
His uncertainty grew further as he spotted Bucky walking up to Howard, talking to him, excusing himself – just to walk down the hallway, vanishing – all of that in the matter of seconds. 

“Wow, did you two have a talk or why did Bucky just leave?” Howard snickered and looked at Steve walking towards him.   
“Yeah, we… we talked. How went things with you and Peggy? Why are you out here?” - “Peggys doc was here, they will operate her tomorrow morning so she’s resting.” Steves eyes grew large, “tomorrow morning? Why so soon?” Howard shrugged, “he said the sooner the better. I suppose it’s not a very good sign.” Steves stomach hurt, but he knew that Howard most certainly felt worse than him.   
“You should get some rest, man. I’ll stay with her.” Howard proposed, but Steve shook his head. “Nah, I'll stay with you. What’s Maria doing?” His friends' eyes went dark, “she’s kind of pissed that I’m here, but to be honest I don’t really care. This is more important to me than she will ever understand.” Steve just nodded and shut his mouth, whatever he had to say, it wouldn’t help Howard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay smut! :D
> 
> I am totally stunned by all of your amazing comments! Thank you so much!


	11. Of apologies and broken doors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The drama is getting real, guys.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: slight cancer-talk, DRAMA
> 
> Revised: yes

Tuesday the 9th of August, 1947  
New York

Steve was alone, his fingers tapped on the table to the rhythm of the clock on his wall. It had been two hours since the beginning of Peggys operation and the nurse had sent him and Howard home, since the removal of Peggys tumors could take the whole day.   
It had started on her breasts, spread to her lymph nodes and once it was in there, there was nothing much a doctor could do except removing anything he could find and hope for the best.  
But Peggy was strong, right? Steve was still tapping on the table, more and more violent with every tick the clock did. 

It was the sound of his doorbell that stopped him. He jerked up, jumping off the chair and slowly going towards his door. “Yeah?” His voice sounded like he had a heavy cold. It was dark and unusually husky.   
“It’s me.” Buckys voice calmed him down immediately. The effect that this guy had on him was dangerously strong. “Bucky?” Steve asked, although he knew that there was only one voice like Buckys, and it never left his head, since that one night in the dirty alley. “Yes, Bucky. Could you please let me in? It’s 10am and already 300 degrees out here.”

“I thought you were working?” Steve opened the door and let Bucky inside without hesitation, but he did wonder why he came. “There are more important things. How are you? Are there news from Peggy?” They stood right next to the door and Steve felt the strong urge to just bury his face in Buckys chest and cry. He felt so powerless. “No. No news. Is that all?” He tried his best to look as reserves as possible, but after everything that had happened, he still could not resist this man. He needed him so badly.   
“No, that’s not all”, Bucky looked at his shoes while talking, “I came mostly because I feel real shitty about everything that happened yesterday.” 

Steve felt crushed. That was the only positive thing that happened to him in the last weeks and Bucky felt bad about it. 

“I totally took advantage of you and I feel bad, your friend is in hospital because of cancer and I took the opportunity of you being hurt and helpless and I just… I couldn’t hold back. I’m sorry, you...”, Steve cut him off as sharp as he could. “You did not take advantage of me. I am an adult, a grown man – more or less – and I can decide for my own what I do with whom and when. Believe me, if I wouldn’t have wanted that yesterday, I would’ve let you know.”

Bucky looked up and Steve saw the same hurt puppy, he saw yesterday. 

“But Howard said that you despise me...” - “What?” - “He said you just felt bad because I was so alone and that you felt creeped out because I made a move on ya.” Steve felt anger pumping into his blood. 

That actually explained a lot.  
But why would Howard do something like this? 

“Look Bucky, I never said anything like that. Actually, I thought you felt this way about me because I am just this small, weird, needy little virgin from Brooklyn that has a crush on someone as gorgeous as you!”   
His face turned red in a matter of seconds.   
Oh god.  
Why.  
Why did he say that?

When he risked a glimpse at Buckys face, he saw the most genuine, warm and soft smile he had ever seen.

Steve wondered if it would come off as weird if he would run to his bedroom to get drawing utensils right now. So he decided to do that another time.  
He stepped closer and pressed his nose and forehead against Buckys chest.

“Hey there little guy, needy much?” Bucky laughed, but pulled him closer. Steve just breathed in and let everything else go. “So you’re a virgin, hm?” His head went red again and he wanted to get away from Bucky to hide his shame, but Buckys arms held him right where he was and he felt the head of the ex-soldier resting on his own. “I personally think that’s adorable. And there is nothing wrong with being a virgin. People will either shame you for having too much sex or they’ll shame you for having none – it’s basically a trap and you can’t make them happy.”

They stood there, close enough that Steve could actually head Buckys heartbeat. It was a peaceful moment, in rough times.

That was until the front door opened and hit both of them pretty hard. “Howard!?” Steve almost gave Bucky a mean punch on the chin with his head as he jacked up and turned around.   
“Steve? James? I thought you two were...”, there was no way in hell that Steve would let Howard finish this thought.   
“Seems like you are not really that innocent on our misunderstanding!”  
Howard looked terrified towards them. But Steve did look scary, well as scary as a 5’’3’ tall blonde with less muscles than a healthy 12 year old could look.   
It was enough to shut down Howards defense. At least for a moment.

“Steve you don’t know who he is! Has he ever told you anything about himself other than his name?”   
Bucky looked scared and his eyes were wide in shock.   
“Yeah, you should go, Howard.” Steve’s voice was straight up and sharp like neither Howard, not Bucky had ever heard it.   
“But Steve...” - “Maybe I should go as well...”, Bucky mumbled. But Steve stopped him, one hand on his chest, one pointing out the door to Howard. “Go!”

Howard looked towards the door and seemed to nod at it, before he turned around. “I came to tell you that Peggy is in a coma. There were complications. But you seem to have other problems, like putting your shitty mistakes on me and making out with dangerous people you don’t even know.”

When he closed the door, Steve almost collapsed.

Peggy.

He saw Bucky heading towards the door and sank down to the floor, sobbing uncontrollably.   
“Don’t you dare leave me here. Everyone is always leaving me! My mom, Peggy and now you! I can’t take this shit anymore. Somehow I always end up alone, facing all those problems on my own with no one by my side! Why can’t I… why do I have to be so helpless all the time...”

He felt Bucky sitting down next to him, but not touching him in any way. 

“I have to leave, Steve. Howard is right...” - “NO HE’S NOT! I am an adult! I already told you that! I am capable of knowing who I can trust and who is dangerous and you are not at all a threat!” Bucky looked down. “What if I were one.” He saw Steve already taking a deep breath for a long ass answer on how stupid Bucky was for saying this, but he waved it off. “When I was a soldier, the Germans took me in when I was wounded, after the grenade by the car. They forced me to DO stuff for them, to get information, to… to kill...”, his voice broke down to a whisper, “to kill so many people. Children, women, men, elders, crippled, there were no limits to my tasks. I got thrown in front of the court when they found me. But they told me that I got drugged with some special serum and that I wasn’t responsible but I was there! I saw the light going out in so many eyes and I will never forget their screams… Howard is right Steve. I am dangerous. I am not a good man. I came back here to start new after therapy. But I am still… still me. And I hate that every day of my life.”

Before Steve could react to the news he just heard, there was a loud bang and Natasha stood with Howard in his door, busting down every piece of wood there was.

“Hands over your head, Barnes!” Natasha pulled a gun and Howard fixated Bucky with his eyes, “it’s over! Done! We know what you did, James. We know everything. Thanks for admitting so easily.”

“I don’t get it… Howard, Natasha... what on earth...” – “Shut up Steve. Hands. Over. Your. Head. Barnes.” Bucky looked horrified, Steve was equally shocked by what was happening and what he just heard. James ducked and looked, like he wanted to run, rather than fight or surrender. Steve stepped – without really thinking about it – in between Natasha and Bucky. 

“Steve, get out of my...” Natasha panted and slightly lowered the weapon. Howard, however just grinned dirtily.

“Oh, your little over protective boyfriend here, he already took down a spy for me, so I wouldn’t hide behind him. Tell me Steve, did you report Jack to us before or after you FUCKED HIM.”

Buckys eyes widened, he took the second Steve aggressively turned over to Howard to jump backwards and throw himself out of the window. 

Off the fifth floor.

It took Steve surprisingly long to get what was happening. Nat, Buckys roommate – Natasha, Howards co-worker. Howard befriending Bucky right after he moved back to Brooklyn, happy when Steve and Bucky fought and seemingly worried when he and Bucky got closer again… “You set up your whole friendship with him, planting Natasha as his roommate, breaking up what me and”, Steve swallowed hard, “what me and Bucky HAD, to spy on him?” Howard opened his mouth but Steve was faster, his voice felt like dry ash in his mouth. “You let me loose on a possibly dangerous war spy, you work yourself into my relationship, destroying everything I live for – KNOWINGLY – after all this shit you pulled on me and Bucky. I can’t even look at you right now. Peggy is DIEING AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING? THIS SHIT RIGHT HERE!” He took a deep breath. “I am going after Bucky now, you better pray to whatever you believe in that he believes me when I tell him that I never was a part of this, because if not, I will crush you.”

“Steve”, Howard began defending himself, “you don’t know what he did. He might be a spy, he… he killed people”, but Steve held up his hand to cut him off. “You stood outside of that door for the whole time right? So you know damn well what I know. And if I’m not mistaken, you also heard him talking out being forced into this. About how he feels. Now, I don’t care how all of that happened. All I know is that you and you”, he looked over to Nat, “have no right to arrest him.”   
But Nat had already lowered her gun and looked over to Howard. “The kid is right Howard. We went too far.”

“Yeah, too far to stop now!” Howard yelled. But Steve glanced at him until he stopped talking.

“Being rich and having connections to the government does not give you the right for this. He went through criminal law and got free, because HE WAS FORCED. I also know, that you used me and our friendship against my will and with knowing how much it would hurt me. I never understood why Peggy left you Howard. But now, I think I do.” 

He turned his back on them, facing the door, ready to leave, when he looked back at them over his shoulder, “oh and one last thing: I don’t care what Bucky did in the past. But I do care what you did to me and to him. To… to us. So if you ever walk into my life again after this night, I swear to God, I will tell the police every dirty, illegal, little secret that I know about you, you both know that there are many of them. And if that means that I go down with you… Than. So. Be. It.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for not updating the last days. I had a lot of summer-barbecues and I always need a couple hours after social events to get back on track.   
> Also, a huge ass part of this got deleted thanks to open office not working at all. So I had to rewrite half of the chapter and that was shit. 
> 
> Let me know what you think of this plottwist in the comments (they literally make my day and inspire me so much so write!) :)


	12. Of the truth and real talks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No triggers  
> Not revised

It took Steve about 5 hours to find Bucky. 

At first he tried Buckys flat, to which he had never been up to this point. But all the knocking and ringing the doorbell was not successful so Steve moved on to the baseball field, the little hill where they first met – he even went to that bar were Bucky had beaten up Jack. 

He was close to giving up when he leaned himself on a house to take a break. About 30 seconds later, when he was looking up to the darkening sky, he noticed where he was.   
The art-school.  
Steve almost had to laugh. Oh the irony. 

His fingers followed the wall towards the door, as he walked down the huge, old building. A surprised sound came from his throat when the main door opened under the pressure of his hand.   
Why was it open?   
He didn’t lose a second thought on that, as he stepped inside, breathing in the air, made heavy from paint and lack of fresh air. Somehow he found his way into the room where he painted Bucky. It’s only been two weeks, but it felt like a life time. 

Steve viewed the paintings of the other students. The assignment had been: A portrait with history.   
Some painted elderly, well most of the students painted elderly. Warheroes, fighters for civil rights, black people, gay people, founders of big companies.   
But still, most of them were old.

There was only one other painting showing someone under the age of 50. It was a portrait of a young girl with a hijab and brown eyes, so glowing and perfect. The caption said ‘the girl who went through hell, but remained an angel’. Steve read through the description and felt the goose bumps raising on his skin.   
This girl flew from her husband at age 12, came to America under circumstances, Steve didn’t even want to think about, worked herself up in a small store and was now at age 41 the first female Muslim to own more than a hundred stores on the east coast. 

And he thought his problems were bad.

Snooping around, avoiding his own work at any cost, he looked through the folders on his teachers table. Mr Coulson was an extraordinary artist, but the drawings Steve found were even better than he would’ve ever thought. Birds, insects, small drawings made with so much detail, it almost looked weird.  
He stumbled across something that made him almost lose his breath. 

It was a loose sketch of their class working on something. Steve was so touched about this. All of them looked so peaceful and quiet, yet he could almost feel the intensity of their working space. 

“You like it?”  
Mr Coulson stood in the door, smirking at how fast Steves shaking hands returned the drawing to the desk.  
“Yeah, it’s fantastic! You are so talented Mr Coulson.” His teacher came closer and smiled warm towards Steve. “You too, Steve. And for the thousands time, call me Phil. Especially since we’re officially in summer break.” Steve chuckled, “okay Mr C... Phil, what are you doing here?” Mr Coulson leaned against the wall and looked casually through the class room. “I could ask you the same question, Steve. I showed the school to some new students who will join us next year. That’s why it’s open at the first place, by the way.” Steve sighted and took another look at the picture in front of him. “I’m here cause I’m lost and I kinda needed a break. I’m searching for someone and I am running out of places to look for him.” - “The guy you painted?” Mr Coulson seemed amused, as he walked over to Steves painting. “That’s an amazing work by the way. And an amazing model. How long have you two been an item now?” Steve stuttered, “We, ehm we are not really. I mean yeah kinda, but not really. I mean…” - “It’s complicated? Yeah, I get it.” 

His teacher paced back to the door, looking back at Steve, “keep it.” Steve looked down at the drawing. “Oh no, I couldn’t possibly...” - “I know you like the drawing and I think it’s in good hands, when I hand it to you. Oh, and kid, I’m sure you’ll find him. You just have to keep looking.” And thus, Mr Coulson was gone. 

And Steve knew where to go.

He had been looking for Bucky at the hospital before, but he only went to the roof and when his missing friend hadn’t been there, he just left. But when Steve opened the door to Peggys room, Bucky sat on the little couch on the other side of her bed, looking up to him with gigantic eyes. Steves heart nearly dropped as he saw Peggy lying helplessly in that bed, but he focussed himself on Bucky. He had time to feel shitty about himself for being selfish later.   
“Thank god I found you!” Steve approached him smiling widely, but Bucky backed off like a cat, that had been sprayed with cold water.

“Man, you really have to calm down. I do not agree with anything Howard said! And I really mean what I said, I don’t care what you did. This is in the past.” - “But you did sell him the spy, right?” Steve nodded quietly. “And you did sleep with him before that, right?” - “No! I swear! Howard told me to set him up and search his apartment for spy-shit. I was not set up to do the same with you! I swear I had no idea that Howard would… use me like that.” He spat out the last couple words.  
“I really wanna trust you Steve. But I...” - “You don’t have to trust me Bucky. We know each other barely a couple weeks and I fully understand that. I am just”, Steve swallowed hard, “I am just asking you for a second chance.” - “Third.” - “What?” Bucky shrugged, “the roof and this morning were the second chance. This is third.” 

“So… am I forgiven?” Steve tried making the saddest, cutest puppy eyes he could manage. “No”, Bucky chuckled, “but I got more than three chances in life and you deserve all the chances in the world.” Steve rose an eyebrow, “That was super cheesy.” - “Okay, that’s it. When you are ready for chance number four, come to my place!” Bucky laughed and tried standing up, but Steve basically threw himself at him, landing on his lap, pushing both of them back down.   
“You are so needy, punk.”   
“And you are a jerk!”

“And I think it’s outstanding how my best friend visits me in hospital just to make out with someone instead of grieving.”

Steve jumped up to run towards Peggys bed. “Well, to be fair you’ve been in that coma for a couple hours, that didn’t really give me any time to actual grieve.” - “Yeah you’re right, totally my fault.” They laughed and Steve hugged her, as good as he could.   
“I am so sorry”, he whispered, “I am so selfish. There was drama with Bucky and god damn Howard – I am so sorry that I brought him here – and I just, I was being selfish and shit and I know that. I basically only cared about myself.”

Peggy slapped him on the back of his head as soon as he finished.

“Howard is a shit head. You are not selfish for caring about your own problems. Also, I am not dying Jesus Christ, who the hell told you I was in a coma? I had operation, yes, but I just woke up from that.” Steve looked at her for a couple seconds. “That means you’re gonna be fine?” She nodded, “but you wont if you ever tell Howard to come here again. I left him for good, Steve.” - “Yeah I got why you did that by now.” Bucky shyly came towards them and sat down next to Steve. “Oh god”, Peggy looked at both of them, “what did he do this time?”

After they told her everything she missed, Peggy looked like she was about to explode. “Howard is so obsessed with spys, he should get dismissed from his bloody job, I swear to god.” 

Bucky and Steve left Peggy a couple minutes after that to let her rest and kind of just awkwardly walked next to each other.   
“Thanks for defending me, by the way.”   
Steve shrugged and tried not looking over at Bucky, although he could feel the stare of the other man on his face. “At least we’re even now, I guess.” 

Oh god. 

Oh god no.

Steve felt the heat rising up in his cheeks as Bucky stopped walking on the spot.  
“What do you mean by that?”  
“Oh nothing.”  
“That was you.”  
“What?”  
“That kid by the tavern that got chased by those gorillas a couple weeks ago!”  
Bucky looked absolutely amused and that confused Steve – big time. “I can’t believe it. What did you do to make them chase you?”   
Steve looked down and bit his lip. “That was the… the spy thing...” - “So I beat up your spy-ex-boyfriend for Howard?” - “Man, I kissed this guy like twice and that was purely for the sake of our country.” - “Yeah, you are a real hero, Steve Rogers.” Bucky laughed and before Steve could help it, he was pinned at a wall nearby. “So you kissin people for ‘sake of good ol’ America, Mr Rogers?” - “No everyone, only the real bad guys.” Steve bit his lip and Bucky laughed his dirty, dark laughter. 

And everything was perfect.  
But Steve HAD to know.

“You beat up those guys like a real pro, man.” Bucky pulled away and started walking again. “Yeah. But I didn’t really hurt them. I try not to hurt people anymore. But when I saw this skinny, blond guy running away and those assholes speaking like that – Couldn’t help it!” - “Also, you were drunk.” - “And also I was drunk.” Steve softly puffed Bucky in the side and chuckled.   
“Honestly, now that I think about it – how could I not see that this was you? I mean how many skinny, small, blond, cute guys are there in Brooklyn?” - “If you call me skinny or small one more time I am going to kick ur ass.” - “What if I’m into that.” - “Oh god shut up.”

Weirdly, them having fun and laughing felt good, but also Steve felt kind of bad. Them being so casual – ignoring the calls from bigots calling them gay (not shit sherlock) – that was such a new feeling.  
But he liked it.  
He could get used to that.  
God how much he’d changed in those couple weeks. From a needy little virgin to a needy little virgin walking down the streets with it’s crush’s hand over the shoulder.  
That was a nice kind of improvement right there.

When they came across the corner of Steves street, saying goodbye was extremely awkward. What was their status? Was there something fitting for: We know each other for about two weeks and made out three times (one of which, next to an asleep recovering cancer patient), had kind of sex once on the roof of a hospital (again – related to the cancer patient), fought about the hostile past of one of them, kind of took out a spy together (not knowingly), oh and one of them stalked the other for about 8 weeks before they met and their only mutual friend hates them.  
Their relationship was fucked up – no matter what they decided to call it.

Steve realized that they were literally just staring at each other at this point. 

“So… good night, I guess?”  
“Yeah. I guess.”  
“Yeah.”  
“Yeaaaaah.”  
“You think I-”  
“You wanna come b-”  
“What?”  
“What?”  
“You wanted to say something.”  
“Yeah you too, go first.”  
“Yeah thanks. I just wanted to ask if I might come over tomorrow, or some day other if you-”  
“No I’m free.”  
“Oh okay.”  
“So – cool?”  
“I guess.”  
“Night.”  
“Night.”

And that was that.


	13. Of a date and a dance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Smut and fluff.  
> Yay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: Yes  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: no

Wednesday the 10th of August, 1947  
New York

Steve was in the middle of cooking when Bucky rang his doorbell. He wiped off the sweat from his forehead and took a short look in the mirror next to his door.   
“Hey!” Bucky looked amazing. A dark blue shirt, loosely tucked in black formal pants. Nice dark leather shoes and a dark jacket topped the outfit and Steve wondered how Bucky managed not melting in that outfit. It was still extremely hot outside.   
He felt under dressed. White shirt and khakis did not hold up to the standard Bucky set. But then again, he probably looked ridiculous next to him not matter what.

“You look amazing!” Steve smiled and stepped away from the door to let Bucky in. “Are you wearing an apron?” The other man grinned and put his jacket off and on the couch. “Yeah, only white shirt. Can’t risk staining that.” Bucky turned to the kitchen part of the tiny apartment and sniffled. “Smells good, whatcha cooking?” - “Oh nothing special. Spaghetti.” - “Can I help?” - “Sure, you can... what on earth are you doing?”

Bucky had stepped back from the kitchen and was in the middle of undoing his shirt. 

“What? Do you have a spare apron for me? No, didn’t think so. Only nice shirt, can’t risk that.” He winked and Steve just kind of gave up and laughed.   
“Shit, you just don’t know how to look bad, don’t you?” Bucky chuckled and scratched the back of his head, “must’ve forgotten that somewhere between me being the uncool junior high kid and me being the cool high school kid.” - “You were uncool in junior high?” - “Oh hell yeah. But one haircut and one try out for the football team later and boom – popular.” Steve chuckled and bit down a tear, trying to cut onions. “I never got to the popular part. But to be honest I never was uncool as well. I was just kind of invisible.” Steve shrugged at Buckys confused look. “I guess I never really stood out. Probably a good thing, right?”

Bucky working in his kitchen with no shirt on was an amazing view. Steve had to admit that cooking was no longer his priority. Watching the half way undressed ex-soldier chopping onions, constantly blinking to stop his eyes from burning, was so much better. 

“Everything okay?”

Hnggggggg

“Yeah sure, I’m just thinking. Onions in here please, just where I put mine.” Bucky hummed approving and looked over to him for new orders. 

Steve didn’t knew, where this came from, but he found himself saying: “You know this has to cook for about half an hour now...”, Bucky slowly came closer and Steve shivered under the touch of Buckys thumbs sliding down on both sides of his hip. It was just a tease, but man, it was one hell of a tease. “And you know”, Bucky started breathing in his neck, “you… you know, the longer it cooks, the better the sauce...”, quick, small kisses on his neck and jaw sidetracked him, “the better the sauce gets. So that means we have…”, he swallowed down a light moan, “some time… to spare… oh.”  
Bucky was already diving down, hands sliding down on Steves hips. As he slowly stood up again, face parallel to Steves body until he looked him right in the eyes, he pulled an obscene grin. “Is that so? How convenient?”

Still grinning, he walked over to Steves gramophone and switched it on. Soothing Jazz filled the room and Steve just stood there, shaking his head laughing. “What are you doing, Bucky?” - “Dancing!” The brunet grabbed Steves hand and pulled him towards the free space, only to swirl him around. “You said we had time on our hands!” - “I was kind of expecting a different activity!” - “Yeah?” Bucky buried his hands on Steves sides and lifted him, turning slowly in a circle. As he let the cute blond guy down, their faces were only half an inch apart.   
“Don’t you dare lift me up again.”  
“Watcha gonna do? Kiss me?”  
“I might.”  
“Nah, I don’t see it.”  
“Watch me.”  
Laughing into a kiss was an amazing feeling. All the drama and the tension just fell off and Steve felt happy. Nice, cosy, warm, with a fuzzy feeling in his stomach and the prettiest guy in New York on his lips.   
Life was good.

But oh, life could get better. And as a matter of fact, it got better this very second.   
Bucky lifted him up again, pushing Steve against the nearest wall, all while kissing. “You are a sucker for pushing people against walls.” - “You wanna try the same on me? Feels real nice!” - “No thanks, I try lifting you up – I probably die.” Steve chuckled, but Buckys eyes were dark and serious, as he lifted the blond a little higher, slowly but absolutely, aggressively sexy letting his tongue slide in Steves mouth.   
“As much as I enjoy...”, Steve almost bit Buckys tongue whilst trying to talk, “...this… wouldn’t it be kind of nicer if we move to my bED…!…?” The last bit came out as a small cry, mainly caused by Buckys hand wandering below Steves shirt. “I fucking hate you, you know that. Your hands are like damn ice cubes.”   
“You want to move to bed? Okay, fine by me”, with the most devilish grin, Bucky moved Steve until the small guy basically lay in his arms and carried him towards Steves bed.   
“I should have known that this would happen.”   
“You are so small, it’s adorable.”  
“Fuck you.”  
“I firmly believe this is your job.”  
Smirking, Bucky threw Steve – who was screaming at this point – on the bed. Crawling over the laughing blonde, he began kissing him again, finishing the job with removing Steves shirt – inhaling sharply. “God, you are a fucking painting.” When Steve got red and tried hiding himself with his arms, Bucky sighted deeply. “You are adorable. But stupid.” He leaned over him and kissed down his neck, his collarbone, his chest – until he reached his belt. “So you know what I am going to do now? I am going to get those pants of yours off, to tease you nice and slow until you beg for me.” Steve moaned and let Bucky pull the pants off his legs. That asshole made his word count and teased him – slowly caressing each of Steves legs, climbing upwards in a speed, that made Steve curl under his movements.   
“Do you have to be so slow?” Bucky just smirked and exposed Steves thighs to place kisses on them. Steve curled even more and let out a small whimper to each of those kisses. “I hate you.” He said, breathing heavily.   
Bucky ‘accidentally’ brushed over the hard on, showing through Steves boxers and Steve stretched his hip towards him to get more.   
But Bucky was merciless and whenever Steve made a move, he pulled away. “Stay down, Stevie. I want to make you feel real good, but you gotta stay still for that.” Steve murmured in disagreement, but he did as Bucky said. The brunet backed off a little, stood up and undressed himself, loving every second that the hungry eyes of Steve swallowed his body.   
He didn’t even bother with his underwear and swiped them off together with his pants – which led Steve to a gasp. 

But Steve wasn’t the only one with a painful boner now, so Bucky made an effort to speed things up – just a little bit. He crawled back on top of Steve, carefully grinding their bodies together, swallowing the moans and whimpers Steve let out. He sucked his way down to Steves waist, let his fingers slip under the rubber band.   
“Bucky”, Steve moaned, “I hate you so fucking much if you don’t speed up I am going to come without you even touching me.” - “That’s endgame, Stevie.” Bucky smirked his smirk and Steve rolled his head in his neck to let out a deep sight – followed by a deeper moan. Caused by the other man dragging down the last bit of fabric in between them, performing a licking motion all the way up Steves cock – but a quarter inch away from it – basically licking air.   
Bucky proceeded to basically suck Steves dick without touching it and Steve felt like he was going to explode just from watching it.  
Bucky was so pretty, so delicate – yet masculine – not to forget the fact that he was a kinky little shit, blowing kisses on the top of Steves dick. The only thing actually touching here, was the hot air steaming from Buckys mouth hitting the sensitive skin. It nearly turned Steve crazy. “Bucky please, please I do anything – just touch me. PLEASE. Oh god I’m gonna...”, the rest of the sentence transformed into a blurry moan, as Steve ached his back – shooting his load on his own stomach – hardly breathing at all, but moaning like crazy. 

Amused, but not impressed, Bucky waited a couple seconds until Steve had calmed down, using the extra time to walk to his jacket – pulling out lube and a condom.   
“But… but I just...”, Steve was breathing almost normally by now, staring at the lube in Buckys hands like it was an alien. “What?” Bucky laughed, “you think this was it? Oh boy, I have so much to teach you. How boring would sex be, if it was over, every time someone comes.” He sat down again, “when was the last time you took a shower?” - “Right before I started cooking”, Steve blushed. “I see”, James hollowed his cheeks and let out the sexiest little chuckle, Steve had ever heard up to that point. “Well, that’s good! It’s not necessary, but easier – especially when it’s your first time… which I by the way still find utterly adorable!” Steve blushed harder, but his view focussed on Buckys hard on. “How in hell is that gonna fit, though?” - “It will, no worries. As much as I want to give it to you as dirty and hard as I can right now – we are going to take it real slow. Promise.”   
Steve swallowed and nodded.   
“One last thing Stevie, are you sure you want this? You waited so long...” - “Yes.” Steve didn’t hesitate. He had been going crazy over this guy for month now, there was nothing in this world that he wanted more than him. All of him.   
“Great. Now I need you to lean back and just relax.” Steve lay down, with a pillow under his head, so that he could watch Bucky. The brunet brushed over the still extremely sensitive skin around Steves balls and cock – making the younger one shudder. He parted Steves legs and took a little bit of lube to smear it around the ring muscle in front of him – massaging it in small circle motions to loosen it up a bit.   
After a couple minutes, he opened Steve up with his pinky, now massaging from the inside – soon enough Steves entry was relaxed enough to take Buckys index finger instead of the pinky. Bucky took his time, exploring – trying to find Steves prostate. Shortly after he added his middle finger inside of Steve – trying to lightly scissor him – he noticed Steve getting hard again.   
The younger one had let out a couple of sights and small moans over the last minutes, but this showed Bucky that he was ready for more. He smiled and put on the condom – which turned out to be a real task with only one available hand. After that was done, he swirled his fingers around inside of Steve, adding the ring finger shortly after that. With three fingers inside of Steve, he brought the blonde one to moan in nearly no time, making small claw motions and turning his fingers around. When he rocked them inside as fast as he could without fearing Steve would get hurt, and as straight forward as possible, he hit the prostate and Steve screamed a small cry out loud. 

Bucky removed his fingers – leaving Steve begging for more as he realized the empty feeling inside of him. “Bucky… I want you inside of me, please, please give me more! Please! I want to feel you!”   
When there was enough lube both on Steves entrance and on Buckys cock, he sat his already dripping tip onto the hole in front of him, pushing gently. Both of them began moaning uncontrollably right after he pushed some more and Bucky leaned over – still slowly letting himself slide into Steve – kissing the bony, skinny chest in front of him. “God Steve, you are so hot and tight, oh god, you have no idea what you are doing to me. I’m gonna take you nice and slowly until every bone inside of you screams for me.” Steve moaned as an answer and rocked his hips as good as he could – with 180 lbs pure muscle leaning on top of him.   
Bucky finally fit all of himself inside, waited leaning on Steves chest, until the breathing of the blonde had calmed a little, before he pulled about halfway out, pushing inside again – this time a little harder – Hitting the prostate of his partner one more time – leaving both of them screaming. Steve, because his prostate vibrated and send shivers and sweat down his spine. Bucky because Steve got tighter as he stopped relaxing – nearly milking Bucky before they’d even started the real act.   
He pulled himself together, pushing him weight up with his arms to gain a little more control over the angle he was hitting Steve with, beginning to pound fast and faster with every go. Everything turned blank for Steve, it hurt, but in a good kind of way. He felt like his head was gonna fall off from all the rolling around. His hands searched for Buckys skin, scratching the living shit out of every piece he could find to pay the pain back.   
“Bucky I swear to god I’m going to come again without you touching me. This is so un – fucking – fair!” He moaned again, whimpering the words out in between the small cries whenever his prostate got hit. Just a few seconds later he made his promise true, coming all over himself – again – contracting so hard around Bucky, that the brunet couldn’t help himself ‘bout to fill that condom up right after Steve had finished. 

Desperately trying to catch a breath, Bucky fell down next to Steve. “God, that was amazing!” - “Not bad for a virgin, hm?” - “Well, you basically just lay there. I did the work so… ouch! Hey!” Steve had thrown a pillow and smiled dirtily at Bucky. 

Something rumbled in the kitchen.

“Oh sweet lord. The sauce…!” Steve pushed himself up and walked – still shaking a little – towards the kitchen. Bucky took a few moments, before he stood up and walked to the bathroom to clean himself up.   
Completely naked, he entered the kitchen, to burst into laughter immediately. Steve stood at his stove, with nothing but his apron on.   
“Bucky, that is absolutely unsanitary. Sit on the table please, I’ll bring the food.” - “You do realize that you are not that much more sanitary that I am at the moment, right?” Steve squinted his eyes, “I’m wearing my apron. Now sit!”   
Bucky obeyed, watching Steves skinny ass throwing noddles into boiling water, still shaking his head at this little punk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is only going to be one more chapter (stucky-fluff) to end this little project of mine.  
> I have a couple more ideas (and I'm already working on 3 of them), so watch out for new projects in the future! More about that in the notes of the last chapter :)


	14. Of happy endings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just happy-ending-fluff, nothing heavy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: -
> 
> Revised: no

Wednesday the 24th of December, 1947  
New York

It had been snowing for days and New York was in a white powdered, unusual calm and peaceful stage.   
Buckys dark hair was filled with small, white snowflakes – melting faster than Steve could count them. The both of them were walking down one of the main shopping roads – searching for perfect Christmas gifts. Bucky giggled as Steve hummed along the Christmas carols, sung by some children on the other side of the road.   
“Any idea what we gonna get Sam?” Bucky shook his head and looked down to Steve. “What did you get Peggy?” - “I painted her something.” - “Why don’t you paint Sam something?” Steve sighted, “First of all, I am not going to paint shit so give away as OUR present to someone when you didn’t do anything and second off – isn’t it a bit cheap to give away nothing bout paintings?” - “Hm, right. Nothing cheaper than something you invested 10+ hours in compared to a ten dollar bottle of wine.”  
Steve gave him a salty look and returned his eyes to the shelves and windows around them. “So you’re thinking wine?” Bucky smiled and put his hand around Steves waist. “I am thinking that we should hurry up! Sam said he and Tash would be over at 4pm – that’s in two hours and your flat looks like shit.” 

Around 20 minutes later they walked home with a nice bottle of wine for Sam and Natasha, expensive chocolate for Steves teacher Mr Coulson and a nice scarf for Peggy – since Steve felt bad for only giving her a painting.   
Just after Bucky had finished the clean up and Steve had wrapped all the gifts to put them under the tree, the doorbell rang and Bucky gladly let in Sam and Natasha – who greeted Bucky with a kiss on his cheek. After the melt-down a couple month ago, she formerly apologized to Bucky and Steve and changed her department, so that she wouldn’t have to work for Howard anymore.  
Since she had been through as much shit as Bucky, they actually grew to become amazing friends – with the occasional windows-smashing-I’m-gonna-kill-you-fights when they disagreed.  
After all – they had been room mates for quite some time before this.

Sam pulled Steve into a tight hug, after shaking Buckys hand, and handed him a bag with presents. “Here for your tree.” Steve took them and placed them nicely amongst the others. “Have you guys seen Peggy?” He asked then, heading for the kitchen.   
When no one answered, he pulled out a mug and set up some tea. Peggy would probably be here any minute.  
He felt Buckys hand on his lower back, as the older one placed a light kiss on Steves forehead. “Can you make me a cup too?” The two of them heard Natashas laughter getting louder behind them. “What on earth are they doing?” Steve mumbled and turned around, to see Peggy standing in the doorway, completely covered in snow – dripping all over the floor.   
“I’m gonna get a towel...”, Bucky jumped towards the bathroom and Steve headed towards Peggy with a steaming mug in his hand. “Looks like you could use some tea.” - “Stevie!” She laughed, took the mug – only to place it on the small side table next to the door – and pulled Steve in a – mostly wet, but also freaking cold – hug.   
“Peggyyyyyyyyy!” He shrieked, trying to get himself away from his laughing friend. “You deserve it! My car broke down two blocks from here so I had to walk! Damn snow!” Thankfully, she took the towel from Bucky – who made his way back to the bathroom to get a second one for Steve. 

They had a nice, cuddly, warm Christmas and everything was perfect. Natasha had towels with their full names made for them, “because every gay couple needs those!” And Steve almost had to wrestle his boyfriend down (which he was – of course – absolutely capable of… yeah….) to get to see his towel.  
“Buchanan? Your middle name is Buchanan?” He couldn’t help but laughing.  
“Shut up, Grant.”

It wasn’t until midnight that Sam and Natasha took a slightly drunk Peggy with them, as they said goodbye and thanked Bucky and Steve for the nice evening.  
It had begun to snow again outside and Steve sat at the window, looking at the street with huge eyes – as if he’d never seen snow before.  
“That was the nicest Christmas I’ve ever had.” Bucky snug himself next to Steve with a gigantic blanket. “Hm, it was pretty nice, I agree!” Steve lay his head on Buckys chest and they sat there, watching the calm world outside – wishing that life could always be that easy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey :)
> 
> Thank you so much for sticking with this story! I had a lot of fun writing it, although I have to admit that it turned out the be completely different from what I planned at first.  
> So there is probably going to be a similar story with a little darker plot in the future!
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoyed it! I will revise the last chapters soon so that I can wrap it up!
> 
> I have a shitload of new idead in my head that I want to write down, so stay tuned on that.   
> It would mean the world to me, if I see some of y'all under future stories!
> 
> \- Michelle ♥


End file.
